Published: 1 November 2026 | Author: Team JanVayu | Reading time: 4 min
On 29 October the Central Board of Secondary Education issued circular Acad-70/2026 on the subjects Class 9 students will study as they move into Class 10. News reports led with one line from it: Environmental Education is out. A post on X by Warrior Moms, which reached us as a screenshot, said that a curriculum cannot claim to prepare children for the future while pushing environmental education to the margins, at a time of escalating air pollution. That is an argument, and a reasonable one for a clean-air platform to take seriously. Before anyone repeats it, here is what the circular itself says.
What the circular says
The sentence that matters is in paragraph (i). It says that the subject "Individuals in Society" and the "Modules of CT & AI" in Class IX (2026-27), and the subject "Environmental Education" in Class X (2027-28), "shall not be the part of the curriculum for these batches". CT & AI is Computational Thinking and Artificial Intelligence.
Three things follow from the text.
- The change applies to the batch now in Class 9 (2026-27), when it reaches Class 10 in 2027-28. India Today reports that the current Class 10 batch keeps the existing scheme.
- The reason given is about timing: the circular says the omission is "to align the introduction of this curricular area with the implementation schedule". It does not say the subject has been judged unnecessary.
- Vocational Education stays compulsory for the same batch, and all other optional subjects available in the 2025-26 scheme continue.
What it does not say
The circular does not say whether Environmental Education returns for later batches. CBSE's Secondary Curriculum 2026-27, Part 1, lists the subject, assessed by the school, in its scheme for 2027-28 and 2028-29. We saw that document only as a search excerpt, so we cannot say how it reads in full. The circular overrides it for this batch, and says nothing we found about the batches after it.
It also does not say whether environmental content continues inside other subjects, such as Science and Social Science, for this batch. We did not find the answer in the circular, and we have not checked the subject syllabuses. Anyone who writes that children will get no environmental learning in Class 10 is going beyond what the document says. Anyone who writes that nothing has changed is as well.
Why it matters for air
In our view, clean-air policy works better when people can read an air quality index, tell a seasonal spike from a lasting change, and ask what a policy did. Schools are one place those skills can be taught, and a Class 10 year without a named subject for environmental learning is a gap for one batch of students, whatever happens to later ones. That is our judgement and not a finding from the circular.
How large that gap is depends on facts we do not have: how many schools were teaching the subject well, what its internal assessment looked like in practice, and what replaces it in the timetable. The circular does not tell us, and we have not seen data on any of these.
What to ask
- Parents and teachers can ask their school how environmental topics will be covered in Class 10 in 2027-28, since the circular leaves that to schools.
- Education departments and CBSE can be asked in writing whether Environmental Education will be implemented for the 2028-29 batch, and on what schedule.
- Anyone quoting the change should quote the circular and its date. News reports and social posts, including this one, are a step removed from it.
Sources
- CBSE, circular Acad-70/2026, "Scheme of Studies", 29 October 2026
- India Today Education Desk, "CBSE drops Class 10 environmental education: New subject choices explained", published 29 October 2026, updated 30 October 2026
- CBSE, Secondary School Curriculum 2026-27, Part 1, read only as a search excerpt
- Warrior Moms, post on X, seen 1 November 2026 as a screenshot, so no permalink is given here