Is it okay to bunk classes before exams?

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal"><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">Case 1:</span> Debarshi Barat, now a first year student at the National University Juridical Sciences, remembers how difficult it was for him to prepare for the entrance exam to the law school and study for his ISC selection exams at the same go, in December last year. We used to bunk classes to prepare for these exams.<br /><br />In fact, many of my batchmates who had science in their plus two didn’t ever take the ISC exams seriously; more important was to crack the competitive exams.�<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">Case 2:</span> Mimi Dasgupta name changed), is a class XII student of a well known south Kolkata school. And though her classes have been dissolved since December, she says that even when classes were on in fullswing, they would not attend class on most of the days. <br /><br />“The H.S. exams begin from April 1. So the three month holiday that we get before is enough to prepare for the board exams. But it’s the competitive exams that need the extra time. And we manage that time by skipping school once the syllabus is over,� she said.<br /><br />“I had taken my Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) exams in October last year. I didn’t have an option but to miss school for two weeks before the exam to prepare for it,� said Punit Kapoor (name changed) a class XII student of La Martinere for Boys. <br /><br />“We do take off just before the various preselection and other term tests, but just before the selections, we go to school regularly for a month to make up for the attendance,� said Chandni Verma of Mahadevi Birla High School.<br /><br />In fact, it’s only the attendance problem that keeps the school authorities from dissolving classes any earlier than December. “We have to maintain a minimum of 75 per cent attendance. That’s why force the students to attend school, though we finish the syllabus by October or November,� said Aloke Khan, HoD of Commerce department of Assembly of God Church School. <br /><br />Incidentally, he is also the administrator of SAT for eastern India. “Our students don’t need to miss classes simply because our board exams take place in May or June, which is long after the examination dates of most of the important competitives,� said Suneeta Sen, viceprincipal of Calcutta International School.<br /><br />However, students feel that though they skip classes, at the end of it the school authorities do help them out in case of a problem. “Unless the attendance is abysmally low, we get through by paying a fine to the school authorities,� said a class XII student of Modern High School. <br /><br />“Though the authorities are strict they do allow us to take off,� agreed another student of the St.Xavier’s School.<br /><br /><span style="" font-style:="" italic="">himika.chaudhuri@timesgroup.com</span></div> </div>