What is Bihar STET
Bihar STET, the Secondary Teacher Eligibility Test, is the state-level screening exam that Bihar candidates must clear before they can apply for teaching posts in government secondary and higher secondary schools. It is conducted by the Bihar School Examination Board, also known as Bihar Vidyalaya Pariksha Samiti, and comes in two separate papers: Paper I for Classes 9 and 10, and Paper II for Classes 11 and 12. A candidate can appear for either paper or both, depending on which level they want to teach.
STET itself is not a recruitment exam. Clearing it only produces an eligibility certificate, valid for life since a Bihar Education Department order dated 22 June 2021. Actual appointment happens through a separate process, most recently Bihar’s Teacher Recruitment Examinations (TRE), where a valid STET certificate is one of the conditions to apply. STET-2026 was notified under Advertisement No. P.R. 183/2026, with online applications accepted from the afternoon of 17 August 2026 through 31 August 2026. The exam date has not yet been announced separately [UNVERIFIED: check the Bihar STET portal for the confirmed date]. STET has been held annually since 2023.
Who should apply
A candidate needs to be an Indian citizen, at least 21 years old as on 1 August of the exam year, and hold the subject-specific qualification for Paper I or Paper II, generally graduation or postgraduation with 50% marks plus a recognised B.Ed. Because Bihar’s category-based age relaxation, the lower qualifying percentage, and the reduced fee apply only to permanent residents of Bihar, candidates from outside the state are evaluated and charged as general category, regardless of their actual category or gender. There is no cap on the number of attempts.
The application fee is ₹960 for one paper or ₹1,440 for both papers for general, BC, EBC and EWS candidates, and ₹760 for one paper or ₹1,140 for both for SC, ST and PwBD candidates. The application photo must be a recent, colour scan of 80KB to 200KB at 3.5cm by 4.5cm, against a white or light background, facing the camera directly with no cap or dark glasses. The signature scan must be 50KB to 200KB. Get both to the exact size with our photo resizer before you start the form, and see the Bihar STET exam page for the current application window.
Syllabus
Both papers share a common 50-mark section on teaching aptitude and general skills. The remaining 100 marks are subject-specific and differ completely from one subject to another, so BSEB releases a separate syllabus PDF for each subject rather than one combined document.
Art of Teaching (30 marks, common to both papers)
- Teaching and learning: meaning, process and characteristics
- Teaching and instructional objectives, including Bloom’s Taxonomy
- Teaching methods, their merits and demerits
- Lesson planning, formats and models
- Microteaching and instructional analysis
- Classroom management and the classroom ecosystem
- Textbooks, libraries and teaching aids
- Qualities of a teacher, curriculum, evaluation and assessment for learning
General Knowledge, Environmental Science, Mathematical Aptitude and Logical Reasoning (20 marks, common to both papers)
- General Knowledge: Indian history and geography, the Indian economy, Bihar’s role in the national movement, current affairs
- Environmental Science: pollution, solid waste, deforestation, global warming, flora and fauna
- Mathematical Aptitude: area, average, compound interest, fractions and decimals, LCM/HCF, heights and distances
- Logical Reasoning: analogy, classification, number and alphabet series, coding-decoding, blood relations, direction and pattern-based reasoning
Paper I subjects (Classes 9 and 10)
Hindi, Urdu, Bangla, Maithili, Sanskrit, Arabic, Farsi, Bhojpuri, English, Mathematics, Science, Social Science, Physical Education, Music, Fine Arts, Dance, and Special Education Teacher. Each carries its own 100-mark subject syllabus at graduation level.
Paper II subjects (Classes 11 and 12)
Hindi, Urdu, English, Sanskrit, Bangla, Maithili, Magahi, Arabic, Farsi, Bhojpuri, Pali, Prakrit, Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Zoology, Botany, History, Geography, Political Science, Sociology, Economics, Philosophy, Psychology, Home Science, Commerce, Computer Science, Agriculture, and Music. Each carries its own 100-mark subject syllabus at postgraduate level.
How the selection works
STET has a single stage for the candidate: the CBT itself. Where the exam runs across multiple shifts or dates because of applicant volume, BSEB applies normalisation to the raw scores so results are comparable across sittings. There is no interview or physical stage attached to STET. Recruitment as a teacher, including any merit list, interview or document verification, is handled entirely by the separate recruitment process, such as Bihar’s TRE, that a STET certificate makes a candidate eligible for.
Preparation, in short
The 50-mark common section repeats across both papers and both levels, so time spent on Art of Teaching, general knowledge and reasoning pays off regardless of which subject paper a candidate is attempting. The 100-mark subject section is the differentiator: Paper I sits at graduation level and Paper II at postgraduate level for the chosen subject, so preparation should follow the relevant subject’s own official syllabus PDF rather than a generic list. With no negative marking, attempting every question is safe, unlike exams that penalise wrong answers.
What the score is used for
A STET certificate by itself does not lead to a job. It is a lifetime eligibility credential that a candidate uses when applying to Bihar’s teacher recruitment exams, whenever those are next announced for Classes 9 to 10 or Classes 11 to 12 posts. Each recruitment cycle sets its own vacancies, cut-offs and further stages, so there is no single “STET cut-off” that determines selection: the STET qualifying percentage only decides who gets the certificate, not who eventually gets appointed.