The four-year degree programme was introduced following recommendations of National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. Although NEP suggested multiple entry and exit options, most universities decided to allow exit only after three years.

By: Dabangana Das

Kolkata: Around 50% of UG commerce students at St Xavier’s College (Autonomous) will opt for the exit option after the sixth semester in 2026, a recent survey has found. The institution will allow UG students in its four-year programme to exit after the sixth semester. Comparatively, in humanities and science, the number of students choosing to leave is below 10%.

St Xavier’s introduced the four-year degree programme in 2023, stating that students would be given an exit option after three years.

To estimate how many want to leave after three years, the college conducted a survey and found that commerce has the highest number of students — around 50% of the total student strength, including morning and evening shifts — who plan to leave.

The 6th-semester exams will be held in April.

Principal Father Dominic Savio said, “Commerce students are more inclined towards professional courses and want to opt for management courses, or chartered accountancy, or something else. We saw that out of 1,200 commerce students, including morning and evening shifts, around 600 want to leave. However, in humanities and science, the numbers are below 10%, which means more students in these two streams want to pursue the four-year programme until the end.”

While CU permitted multiple entry and exit, most students did not opt to exit after the 1st or 2nd year.

CU registrar Debasis Das said, “There is no record yet that students opted for exit after the 1st or 2nd year.”

Most college principals said although this option is available to CU students, they understand that leaving a course after the 1st or 2nd year is not a wise decision. However, they anticipate that a sizeable number may opt to leave after the 6th semester.