Subject: Collective Disagreement of the students toward the Examination Guidelines and a proposed

revision of the same

To whomsoever this may concern,

With all due respect, we would like to say that we find the examination guidelines absolutely
inconsiderate and heedless.

We understand that your focus in setting these guidelines was to retain most of the strictness and
austerity of the physical exam but somewhere down that road, you have failed to practice any
empathy to understand the student’s perspective.

We would like to point out some of the many points that are really unacceptable to the students:

 Some students have a room not large enough to accommodate a desk with a
laptop/computer and at the same time place a phone at an angle that exhibits us, our
desk, our laptop/computer for 2 hours straight which will also require a charging point
within reach. For some people, a setup like this is not manageable under any scenario.
Not to mention that this will adversely impact the battery lives of all phones, even the
most expensive ones, as they are not made to engage in a two hour long video
conference. There is also a high possibility of the phone disconnecting from MS Teams
due to network issues or low battery, in such a case the students won’t be even aware
that their phone has disconnected since it is placed behind them and they will not be
paying any attention to their phone. Nor can they be made aware of this fact by the
invigilator or a student.

 It is also important to note that for a lot of students, the resources (devices, internet,
rooms) are limited and are being shared by family members. Some parents are on full-
time work from home duty and the siblings have their online school/college classes
which will result in clashing of timings and excessive load on the network and could lead
to disconnection and unstable connectivity if not completely frozen screens.

 For most students so far, not one lecture has gone by without having some sort of
disconnection either due to network or any other hardware issues. In fact, some
teachers have taken lectures from within the college premises and have failed to
conduct a smooth lecture in spite of using the college’s network and its infrastructure.
On top of that, you mentioned in the guidelines that 10 minutes of disconnection will
lead to our online exam getting cancelled and that resulting in us having to attend a
physical examination in the future. Such guidelines are taxing and create an atmosphere
of panic for the students. Also, some of us have an internship outside of this state in the
next semester. It makes no sense to travel across states to attend one physical paper
due to a 10-minute network failure.

 Some students living in tier 3 cities have really poor and unreliable network connection.
It is next to impossible for them to fix their internet issues because their village/town
lacks the necessary infrastructure that supports stable and reliable network to connect
multiple devices and run video calls on them simultaneously.
  Also, in these unprecedented times, it is very insensitive of you to ask students to go and
spend extra money to fulfil specific examination criteria. Also, with the rapid increase in
COVID cases once again, it is not thoughtful to ask anyone to relocate.

 It is necessary to point out that the exams going to be held for practical subjects like
Management Accounting, Direct Tax, Corporate Finance, etc will be held on MS EXCEL
and there a lot of students who have no idea how to properly use it and make sure they
don’t make a mistake because it wasn’t taught to them prior and had to learn it 15 days
before the actual TEE.

 As stated above many of us connect from places where there have been some or the
other internet issues going on wherein some students have even missed out on a couple
days’ worth of classes. We’re sure you’ll understand just how hard it is, not only for the
teachers to adapt to this new normal and teach us online, but also how hard it was for
students who had to absorb material only through a small screen in front of them for 4
hours a day.

 This also gives added Mental Pressure of not failing. Many students have been unwell,
some have even contracted COVID - 19 and after that, they were supposed to cover up
on the work that was done but in subjects like Direct Taxes and Management
Accounting, it becomes almost impossible. As it is we are supposed to study online
which isn't very viable, but on top of that if someone misses a practical subject there is
no way they can catch up with what's going on in the class. Due to this many students
are already in Mental pressure as to how they will perform in internals and adding
finals on such a platform will affect the students and their scores.

 We have also been informed that there is a lot of construction work going on in some
locales of MUMBAI and hence the students living there are facing an extraordinary
amount of power surges, internet being down and overall connectivity issues.

 We would also like to point out how the college is fixated with the students’ input when
it comes to filling long feedback forms but on the contrary, examination guidelines,
which in these times need to be on students’ terms get finalized with little attention paid
to the student’s perspective and the possible problems they could face trying to adhere
to these guidelines.

We are not here to argue and create an atmosphere of conflict. All we recommend is that you
maintain a simple, acceptable examination criterion that no student would want to challenge.

We propose 3 plausible scenarios:

a. 1 hour exams with one device only. The end terms exams are conducted as online test
wherein the use of only 1 device is required – a laptop/computer with the web-cam and the
mic turned on. (The same way in which the mid-term tests were conducted). Both, the
students and the faculty are familiar and comfortable with this approach, OR

b. A setup wherein the students’ ICA marks are doubled . This has been done before in the
earlier semester and honestly this option does good for both, the students as well as the
institution. The students get a higher CGPA because it is comparatively easier to score in ICA
as there isn’t a huge burden over their heads as there is going to be in this proposed online
 exam, and due to students scoring a higher CGPA, the average result of the college itself
will turn out to be better.

c. More assignments. Instead of doubling the ICA MARKS, there could be double the
assignments given to students with a reasonable deadline date and that way our 100 marks
be graded on assignments, internal tests of 10 marks and any other Internal component like
VIVA, etc.

Also, there needs to be an understanding that a network disconnection or a hardware failure is likely
even after n number of precautions. This happens during online lectures, so there is no reason for
the issue to not occur during a 2-hour examination.

In our opinion, this is the most suitable path and also the path of least resistance, both for the
institute and the students.

This letter is not an attempt to dupe the authorities. Furthermore, we would like to certify that
academic integrity will be maintained at all times. We would like to conclude this letter with an
expectancy that the authorities will revise the guidelines and make it a little more suitable.

IN SUMMARY:

Please conduct the finals EITHER AS:

A. THE MID TERMS WERE CONDUCTED (1 DEVICE-1 HOUR); or

B. DOUBLE THE ICA MARKS LIKE LAST SEMESTER; or
C. DOUBLE THE ASSIGNMENTS WITH REASONABLE DEADLINES.

REASONS:

THE REASONS FOR THIS REQUEST ARE:

1. UNAVAILABLE SPACE AT HOME/UNMANAGEABLE SETUP AT HOME

(with added drawback of not knowing if the phone is even on or not)

2. SHARED RESOURCES
(Rooms, INTERNET, laptops/tablets, etc)

3. UNRELIABLE HARDWARE ISSUES

4. UNRELIABLE SOFTWARE ISSUES

5. UNRELIABLE INTERNET
(Electricity being cut, slow speeds, bandwidth issues)

6. RELOCATION TO DIFFERENT CITIES IMPOSSIBLE DURING COVID

 (Given that second wave is JUST going to hit and THIRD WAVE OF CORONA HAS ALREADY
HIT CITIES LIKE NEW DELHI)

7. STUDENTS UNUSED TO EXCEL LEADING TO PROBLEMS IN ANSWERING

8. IMPOSSBLE TO HAVE 0 ISSUES DURING 2 HOUR SLOTS, WHERE EVEN OUR 2 HOUR CLASSES
HAD SO MANY ISSUES.

9. MENTAL PRESSURE
(Students have been sick, even caught COVID – 19, and missed classes on which it became
impossible to catch up)

10. CONSTRUCTION WORK IN MUMBAI

(Due to construction work going on there is power surge and internet being down multiple
times a day)

11. STUDENTS’ OPINIONS NOT EVEN CONSIDERED

(Even though faculty feedback was so important that we couldn’t access the website until
the feedback was filled, despite the fact the faculty feedback isn’t what should be the
priority of such a top tier college right now)