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WHAT SHOULD BE done about the Leaving Certificate this year?
Students who have been preparing for two years for the senior State examination are confused over what to study, what to prioritise, and how to strategise for an exam that will be dramatically different from previous years.
Although a date has been provisionally chosen for the Leaving Cert to take place, sixth year students may be justifiably wary after plans were made for the Junior Cert, and then changed when schools and parents objected.
Now, the Children’s Ombudsman Dr Niall Muldoon is saying he has received a “large number of complaints made by parents and students” about the Leaving Cert over the past few weeks.
One teacher told TheJournal.ie that the problem is, no matter what arrangements are made, it will suit some students and not suit others, such is the difficulty of the situation.
Nonetheless, a decision needs to be made and made soon. So here are the options and the snags involved with each.
Niamh Prendergast / Twitter
Niamh Prendergast / Twitter / Twitter
The Leaving Cert goes ahead on 29 July
Education Minister Joe McHugh first gave this date for the Leaving Cert on an Instagram Live chat with SpunOut, where he directly answered students’ questions for an hour.
At that point, he said himself that the details of the Leaving Cert, including whether it would be held on 29 July, would be confirmed during the first week in June.
There is a lot left to still be decided – although schools themselves are to organise how to socially distance students and desks , the Department of Education still has decisions to make.
Speaking to TheJournal.ie previously, student Molly Gordon Boles said: “We don’t have a timetable, we don’t know how the structure of it will work, we don’t know how it will work sitting the exam,” she said.
For example, what will happen with practical exams? There are hours of work left to do in the practical exams for Art, Ag Science, Construction, and Engineering.
Awarding these subjects full marks isn’t as simple as it was for the oral exams and music practical: in the case of the Art exam, the practical project and life drawing account for 62.5% of the overall grade.
The issue of slow broadband hindering some students in keeping up with lessons and accessing information was also raised, as being particularly unfair to students from rural areas or who don’t have a spare laptop or computer at home.
There’s also the issue of the written exams themselves: one teacher who spoke to TheJournal.ie suggested that there had been talk of reducing the written elements, to reflect the difficulty in studying during a pandemic.
Predictive grading
This would be a way of marking students based on their performance to date, through a mix of written and practical work, and could happen in a number of ways.
One suggested method would be to use the results of the Mock exams, which are held around Christmas time and involve a set of sample papers to give students an idea of what to expect from the State exams.
The problem with Mock exams, as was raised repeatedly on Liveline yesterday, is that students can sometimes access them ahead of time because schools don’t hold them in the same week.
The other issue is that not all schools hold Mock exams, and some students don’t perform fully in the preparatory exams but do in the final State exams in June.
Minister Joe McHugh said on the SpunOut interview that he didn’t believe that would be a fair system, because the way the exams are corrected could vary wildly from teacher to teacher and from school to school.
The result of the Leaving Cert is often linked to entry exams for a number of third-level education placements and other courses, so that’s a further consideration in any rescheduling of exams.
Yesterday, discussions at the Department of Education included “alternative assessment models” for the Leaving Cert.
ISSU survey
In a survey by the Irish Second-Level Students’ Union (ISSU) on four days from 1-5 May, 79% of almost 24,000 students said they were in favour of the exams being cancelled in favour of predicted grading.
Just 15% of students were in favour of the current proposal of starting exams on 29 July.
Despite the support for this option on ISSU notes the concerns of these students regarding predicted grades. It is clear that the predicted grading model needs to be developed, but it must ensure fairness and equity.
Ciara Fanning, president of the ISSU said: “This survey reinforces our mandate for clarification now – particularly as an increasing number of students are now in favour of cancellation and a thoughtful process established to ensure fairness and equity to all.”
In April, the National Parents Council Post Primary surveyed more than 30,000 parents and asked them “Are you happy with the Department of Education and Skills decision to defer the Leaving Certificate State Exams to July/August of 2020?”
71% said no, and 28% said yes.
Holding the exams later
There is some leeway for the exams to be held later, but not a lot. The exams are stretched out over a number of weeks, meaning this year’s exams should finish before the end of August (though a timetable is still to be published).
If it creeps any further into the autumn, things get trickier as it has to be carried out before third-level courses begin, and with enough time for the exams to be corrected. They will also need to be carried out before the other secondary-school years return to school – if social distancing measures are to be complied with.
There have also been concerns that there will be a second “wave” of Covid-19 in the autumn, so, depending on when the Leaving Cert would be pushed back to, it could be cancelled or postponed again if there’s a surge in cases.
“I believe the government cannot continue to adopt this wait and see approach with the Leaving Cert. It is becoming clearer with every week that passes that it is simply not tenable for it to proceed,” Fianna Fáil’s education spokesperson Thomas Byrne said.
The Children’s Ombudsman Dr Niall Muldoon met Minister Joe McHugh yesterday to discuss concerns raised by parents and children, which related to mental health, special education needs, digital discrimination, and inequity in the provision of continuity of learning.
Muldoon also said that “on a purely human level there are 61,000 children who are deprived of all the positive elements of finishing school, the comradery, the sports days, fun days and general acknowledgement that they have moved from a child to an adult over a six year period”.
This is a crucial rite of passage for so many and it is the closeness of friends and the support of teachers and other school staff which makes the chore of studying worthwhile – but that has been taken away from this cohort of children and it will always hurt, no matter what results they get in the exams.
“I really hope that clarity can be provided to children, their parents and teachers as soon as possible to avoid further anxiety amongst an already vulnerable group of people.”
The Taoiseach acknowledged the stress Leaving Cert students are under, and told the Dáil today: “I fully appreciate the distress and the uncertainty which sixth year students are under.
“I still get nightmares about my Leaving Certificate maths paper, I know how traumatic the Leaving Certificate can be for many people. We will try to bring a conclusion to this matter this week as best we can,” Leo Varadkar said.
The ASTI and TUI issued this short statement today:
“The Executive Committees of the ASTI and TUI met separately last night (Wednesday).
“The unions will continue to engage through the advisory group of stakeholders in relation to contingency arrangements for the State Examinations and will not be commenting further at this point.
“Teachers continue to support their students in these difficult and extraordinary times.”
The ability to change property tax + or – 15%…guess which one
A smart county will lower the tax to encourage inward investment and property purchases.
….. or……. they will all raise the tax together….
Wonder which it will be.
Depends who you vote for then, doesn’t it? If you don’t like a councillor’s decision on the matter then you vote them out. As these are local elections, it’ll be much easier to hold them accountable for broken promises than TDs. Similarly, people are more likely to vote for independent candidates or take a chance on candidates in local elections which again would increase accountability and choice for people.
OK I agree with this in principle but am concerned that the already top-heavy local council hierarchy will remain with highly paid local council employees being shuffled around instead of being made redundant. Can’t upset the unions can we Phil ?
I’d tend to agree that we need to see exactly what sort of reductions this means from a staff level perspective, especially in those merged councils. Surely there are opportunities for reductions there.
they can be redeployed anywhere within the public sector so if the dept of education or social protection is in need of people, they can go work there instead.
That’s fine Sandra and if people can be gainfully employed elsewhere that would be brilliant. The key word here is “gainfully”. I have seen so many times, public servants sitting on their hands waiting for retirement in a “job” of which they have no knowledge or interest. I feel sorry for them but at the same time, it’s a complete and utter waste of taxpayers money – money that could be used elsewhere much more effectively.
It’s still based on the old idea of counties. This tribalism is not good for the country. I don’t see why we can’t just scrap counties altogether and come up with a system that balances population with geography. We’ll still support the counties in the GAA, but why do we have, for example, one administrative unit in Leitrim representing 30,000, one in Meath representing 180,000 and 2 in Cork representing 480,000?
It’s an archaic system Brian. While these changes are welcome in my opinion, I wish some politician had the balls to tackle it more extensively.
don’t forget we also have a town council for for every little town with more than one pub…
Alien8, this bill will abolish those town councils. As for councils based on county boundaries; that’s a fair point but I think the size of the council reflects the population discrepancies with bigger councils for bigger population spreads.
That’s true ignoreland. However, if you take a look at my home county of Meath. Laytown, Bettystown and Mornington are part of Meath. They would be better served under an administration run from Drogheda. Likewise, Clonee would be better served along with Blanchardstown and Mulhuddart. Where I currently live, Sligo, Manorhamilton is served by Carrick on Shannon, despite the fact you have to leave Leitrim to get from one to the other. Manorhamilton would be better served from Sligo. The counties were established as districts for military and taxation purposes. We need new districts based on geographic, demographic and economic reasons and to cut down on duplication and administration.
I don’t think you can ever complain about having to leave Leitrim. Ever.
Fair point, Brian!
Merging Limerick councils is an absolutely brilliant idea. Having two up to this point has contributed hugely to the decline in the city centre as the county council kept allowing big retail parks just over the city border
The lack of business has nothing to do with the cost and availability of parking which would be under the remit of the city council? Nothing to do with the fact that the few free places to park around the city are dwindling as the council mark them with lines and hire more tax gatherers/traffic wardens? There are many reasons to merge Limerick councils but this is hardly one of them.
While these are welcome steps, 31 one local authorities is still way too many in a small country. We could probably survive quite well with about 15. Every county does not need it’s own council.
More tax hikes on the way Phil ???
The Bull Hogan should put the road tax on to the fuel, But no lets make it hugely complicated and do it that way instead.
And not one single person will lose their job.
Alot of Councillors tend to be close to the retirement age and would be going anyway… just not being replaced this time round is where the numbers will be saved.
A lot of councillors will lose their positions, for most of them it’s not a full time job anyway.
I hope the urban councillors take a case against this erosion of our local democracy. I get the feeling that the FG leadership would like to run the country as a dictatorship rather than a democracy!
This is one if the few good proposals brought forward by this administration.it should lead to a streamlining of local govt. There are town councils for towns of 250 people or less in some cases which is just ridiculous and costly. One county council is enough in most cases. People keep saying we have too many politicians and yet when they propose to reduce the number, it’s an erosion of democracy?
Whats the betting these useless so called local public servants that will get their walking papers wont also walk away with a huge pay off and pensions,all paid for on the backs of the taxpayers
this is probably what will happen! it happened before! A sense of entitlement!
This sounds like one of the worst idea’s Ive ever heard. What is with this government and thinking that giving more work to less people makes things “More efficient”?? It DIDNT work with SUSI, and it wont work here. All this sounds like is another scheme to save money, by taking away peoples town councils. STOP harassing us.
It will work with SUSI. Having multiple authorities duplicating loads of things is very inefficient. Student grants is one example and water is another. The setup of the driver licence agency is another welcome improvement. Having multiple councils all doing these things is madness. We don’t do change well in Ireland generally.
114 councils in a country of 4.6 million is your idea of efficient? Really? OK, some people don’t like the government but this is a good move. It will save the tax payers money and will make local authority more accountable.
In France they have 36,500 communes with local government!
And do you think Irish people would be happy with French tax rates to fund that level of bureaucracy Francis? They have two levels of property taxes as far as I know.
…and the last time France posted a national budget surplus was in 1972!
Mike, take the apostrophe from “idea’s” and stick it after the I in “Ive” please. There are other apostrophe gaffes, btw.
There needs to be a major review of current council staffing levels. I have heard from several council office workers that they can’t be sacked and all the pay cuts dealt out to the public service have been cancelled out by their automatic increments in pay every year which are NOT performance related. There can’t be immunity to redundancy in cases of poor performance. Haddington Road forced a few extra hours onto these people which is pointless if the quality isn’t there. Merging inefficient councils just makes a bigger inefficient council. No change
I thought this bill was already in place!
Better late than never I suppose.
More pain from the minister for “couldn’t give a shite about people”
What pain exactly?
Dermot – please don’t ask for facts. Some people just want to moan!
@ Jim walsh and Dermot Lane. If your too thick to figure it out then let me fill you in, hogan is the same Bo***x whos bringing in water meters and the household tax, probably the minister who is implementing more hardship on his own that any other minister, so i reserve the right to “Moan” as you call it, i didnt vote the P***k in so i have every right to dislike what he stands for.
Yes john but don’t let your hatred of the man stop you from recognising that this is a good proposal which if done properly will save millions for the taxpayers. Or would you prefer we continue to waste this money just because it’s Hogan proposing it? The only pain felt here will be felt by the politicians who will lose their place on the councils and that can’t be a bad thing.
My guess is that the populace would reject this proposed legislation if it were put before them as a Referendum. Let us recall that the Referendum on the right of the Oireachtas to hold Enquiries was rejected out of pure spite and the recent Referendum on the abolition of the Seanad which would have removed sixty simpering and costly Senators was also lost.
This proposal on Local Government is a wonderful start on Political reform and if I have a criticism it would be about it not going far enough!
It’s called democracy mr dickie
Martin
Pray tell me what is it that we call democracy? If you read my contribution I simply made an observation on the decisions of the electorate in two recent Referenda! Why have you inferred that I have some difficulty in understanding that this was democracy? Pray tell.
People were given a choice and voted against that’s democracy not spite you little narrow minded man
I hope the urban councillors take a case against this erosion of our local democracy. I get the feeling that FG would rather we were a dictatorship than a democracy!
‘There will be a devolving powers to local authorities’ – sloppy writing.
A bit unfair, Tony. Just use the Tip/Correction option.
While I welcome these proposal I think we could have gone a lot further. We will still have over 900 local councillors.
To be honest I think Ireland could do with around 9-10 regional authorities of around 40-50 members each. They could be setup to have roughly similar population level although Dublin would probably still have a greater size than the rest of them so it might still have to be split in some way. This would reduce the inequality in sizing as currently exists within the county council system. It would also give the councils a wider brief rather than their own narrow county interest.
Finally as time goes by more power could be devolved to the authorities which would allow our national TDs not to operate as super-county councillors and let them concentrate on truly national matters.
In fact we’ve had 8 Regional Authorities (Midlands, South-East etc.) for almost 20 years (bit smaller in size of membership than those you suggest Jim) but they’ve had what few powers they were given to coordinate public services, planning and EU support eroded to a bare minimum. Now they’ve been abolished.
Why are people – notably the media – simplistically obsessing about the reduction in the numbers of Councillors instead of the key issue of devolved power versus centralisation. Virtually since independence, our version of local government (actually ”local administration” is the more correct term in our case) has been the weakest and most limited system in Europe (which is quite a feat considering that we’ve recently heard that our Parliament is also the weakest). Addressing this issue and exotic notions such as good governance, accountability, providing the basis for bottom-up economic and community development etc. in order to properly represent the views and serve the needs of local communities is how this ”radical reform” will ultimately be judged.
Something seriously needs to be done with North Tipperary. The County Manager and the Elected Councillors and in particular the Planning Department are an absolute joke.
‘Accountability ‘ oh that old chestnut.
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