Exam-related distress calls from students drop in Kerala but their concerns severe

While the number of calls was half of what the counselling cell had handled last year, the intensity of their issues was far higher

A girl from Malappuram was so petrified about appearing for the recently-concluded higher secondary exams that a team of three faculty members trained in counselling had to rush to her home on the eve of the exams to instil in her enough confidence to allay her fears.

This was among the many instances of exam-related issues handled by the helpline run under the Career Guidance and Adolescent Counselling Cell (CG&AC) of the General Education Department. Ten trained faculty members handled the calls received over the helpline that functioned at the Directorate of Higher Secondary Education from March 24 to April 26.

“We received calls from 300 students who mostly suffered from exam-related distress. While the number of calls was half of what we had handled last year, the intensity of their issues was far higher requiring our counsellors to spend a minimum of 30 minutes on each call. This was probably because despite the best efforts of teachers students were still anxious about facing a public exam after school only for a few months since November. Also, unlike in the past, students returned the call in large numbers to extend their appreciation for our intervention,” said C.M. Azeem, State coordinator, CG&AC.

Students facing a normal exam season for the first time in the last two years since the onset of the pandemic have also been cited as another probable cause for their heightened anxiety. The helpline even had to arrange for last-minute intervention and sustained follow-up thereafter at the district level through the coordinators of Souhrida Clubs, which were set up a decade back for adolescent counselling and health care and are now functioning in over 1,600 higher secondary schools.

Interestingly, the opposite was suspected to be the case when it came to SSLC students who also used to avail of the helpline facility in large numbers in the past. SSLC students had come through a very liberal appraisal mechanism and that probably lulled them into a relative comfort hardly bothering about the seriousness of the exams. The same seems to apply in the case of plus one students who are yet to appear for the exams.

Apart from the helpline, CG&AC had also created a panel of 5 faculties each for 14 different subjects for addressing the subject-specific issues. While on holidays, their service was available throughout the day, on exam days they were available for two hours each in the morning and evening.