Stakeholders are upset over the ‘meagre’ ₹1,000 per annum scholarship given to beneficiaries of the Tamil Nadu Rural Students Talent Search Examination (TRUST). The scholarship is given to rural students with parents earning less than ₹1 lakh per year.
While the TRUST exam covers syllabus taught in Class 8, it is administered to students in Classes 9 to 12 in all government-recognised schools in rural areas. The subjects include mathematics, social studies, mental ability, and science. And it emphasises application-based questions, particularly in the mental ability section, to assess students’ reasoning and comprehension skills.
Following the announcement of the December 2023 TRUST exam results on February 16, concerns have surfaced regarding a decrease in the number of students scoring above 50 marks out of 100 compared with the previous year.
With pass mark set at 50 and eligibility criteria based on caste, only 1,472 out of 4,131 students (about 35 %) who took the exam in the State last year passed. This marks a decrease from the 47% pass rate in 2022, when 4,200 students appeared for the exam.
Lack of reforms
Despite being initiated in 1991 by Government Order 960 of the Tamil Nadu government, neither the syllabus nor the scholarship amount has seen a revision in the past three decades, failing to keep up with the rising cost of living and education expenses. “Without basic revision, we are not motivated to study for the test. An amount of ₹1,000 per year is hardly a scholarship,” said Shankar Inbaraj, a Class 12 student from Alandurai in Coimbatore.
Lack of trained teachers
Further, since the exam’s inception, teachers in the State have allegedly not received any special training to prepare students for it. “While algebra is typically introduced to students in Class 8, the exam poses more complex questions. Relying solely on outdated question papers for practice throughout the year is insufficient,” said K. Palanivelu, a mathematics teacher at a government school in Kanniyakumari.
Insufficient study materials
Teachers allege that presently, Tamil-medium students receive an out-dated PDF reference material for the exam, whereas those in English medium lack any such support. Moreover, numerous students from low-income families face challenges accessing resources like smartphones and the internet for exam preparation.
“As we are unable to afford a smartphone for our son, we depend on the Education Department and school to provide him with physical reference materials, but unfortunately, that has not been the case and we are unable to help out at home,” said R. Kumudam, a daily wage worker from Tiruppur.
Proposed solutions
Advocating for reforms, stakeholders are calling for increase in budget allocations for student scholarships. While the government has embraced the National Means-cum-Merit Scholarship Scheme (NMMS), which provides ₹1,000 per month for four years to children from families earning less than ₹3.5 lakh per annum, experts contend that the TRUST programme, tailored to the State, offers better chances for students to avail of scholarships.
As many as 2,22,985 candidates from all schools in the Tamil Nadu took the NMMS examination 2023, with only 6,695 candidates passing the exam. “NMMS is also more challenging to crack and reduces the chance for scholarships, since it is conducted nation-wide,” said R.S. Balakrishnan, a retired headmaster from Coimbatore.
To improve this, experts propose revising the syllabus, enhancing teacher training programmes, providing accessible physical reference materials and increasing the scholarship amount to a minimum of ₹6,000 per annum. “Given the drastic rise in living and education costs, a revision is long overdue,” said S. Sivakumar, former Principal of District Institute of Education and Training (DIET), Kancheepuram.
