Is the leaving cert system adequate

steddyeddy

steddyeddy wrote: »

I think anyone with a reasonable amount of intelligence can get 600 points with a lot of hard work. Those six hundred points grant entry into any course regardless of the suitability of the student for the course. The leaving cert should be more tailored for the universities needs.

But surely the universities' needs are people who are able to put in a lot of hard work?

riclad

most people dont want to be a lawyer or doctor.IT S fair in that ,everyone has a chance to get the points they need.
IT would be great to make an exam system that rewards creative thinking
or logical thinking, more than memorisation of facts.I think it would be better to let people choose 5 or 6 subjects ,for the leaving.
But when you go to college ,you ,ll still need to do exams .IT seems
like the leaving is designed to give you x amount of points ,not very
relevant if you have no intention of going to university.
theres plenty of successful people out there who, didnt get good leaving certs results.

steddyeddy

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

Continuous assessment is a load of old horlicks - some courses excepted - and it would probably be examined by the teacher in the school, who has no incentive to fail anybody. Even if external examiners examined, whats to stop students getting help from teachers or parents before submitting to the externals? What if a teacher is biased?

It won't work. As for rote, I am not sure how rote the leaving certificate is these days, it wasn't so much in my day. Some subjects lend themselves to rote, and some don't. Critics of "rote" learning tend to compare the leaving cert unfavourably with college courses, but law, biology, medicine and many other college courses are rote. Learning is learning, knowing the names of plants is rote, the symptoms of a disease is rote, the result in the supreme court case No" Vxiii, Johnson Vs O'Sullivan is rote.

Applying this is not rote, but the leaving cert will be - on average - less rote than some college courses.

In fairness first year science is Continuously assessed and it works for that. I dont see why it cant work for the leaving cert.

Mardy Bum

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

Continuous assessment is a load of old horlicks - some courses excepted - and it would probably be examined by the teacher in the school, who has no incentive to fail anybody. Even if external examiners examined, whats to stop students getting help from teachers or parents before submitting to the externals? What if a teacher is biased?

It won't work. As for rote, I am not sure how rote the leaving certificate is these days, it wasn't so much in my day. Some subjects lend themselves to rote, and some don't. Critics of "rote" learning tend to compare the leaving cert unfavourably with college courses, but law, biology, medicine and many other college courses are rote. Learning is learning, knowing the names of plants is rote, the symptoms of a disease is rote, the result in the supreme court case No" Vxiii, Johnson Vs O'Sullivan is rote.

Applying this is not rote, but the leaving cert will be - on average - less rote than some college courses.

I agree entirely and would say all sit down exams in college no matter what the course is open to rote learning whether it be science business or the humanities.

steddyeddy

true-or-false wrote: »

But surely the universities' needs are people who are able to put in a lot of hard work?

The fact is universities require a lot more than hard work. A person with a natural aptitude for science is far better to science than someone who just works hard.

thebankers

The LC means nothing. I much prefer my ability to question bull**** through critical analysis any day of the week. Those 18 years of schooling where basically robbed from my life by technocrats and politicians. A total waste. Why not just skip school entirely, work for a few years, than apply as a mature student?

Wish I had of done that. In a country of only 4 million odd people, the Leaving cert is insignificant. Mother Nature does not give a toss about how many points you got in your leaving. This cesspit we call "community" will be tossed aside through evolution. This comforts me immensly.

The Leaving cert is only important, because politicians attribute meaning to pieces of carbon on a page. It's a pointless exercise, really. It's all about controlling the populace. Society is messed up.

tl;dr - The Leaving cert is a fictional abstraction, a figment of your imagination. Numbers on a page for the technocrats who wish to enslave you and your children.

Duggys Housemate

steddyeddy wrote: »

The fact is universities require a lot more than hard work. A person with a natural aptitude for science is far better to science than someone who just works hard.

Presumably this guy would have done mostly science in his leaving. He should also have to do other things, since the leaving cert is not just to guide people to university courses, it is more rounded.

steddyeddy

steddyeddy wrote: »

The fact is universities require a lot more than hard work. A person with a natural aptitude for science is far better to science than someone who just works hard.

So if someone has a natural aptitude for science, and little aptitude for languages, but their dream is to get a degree in French and travel with it, and they're prepared to work their ass of for it, you don't think they should be accepted??

If someone has to work twice as hard, and is willing to, surely that makes them even more deserving of their place?? If they're passing their college exams then what does is matter whether or not they have a natural aptitude?

AngeGal

steddyeddy wrote: »

I think anyone with a reasonable amount of intelligence can get 600 points with a lot of hard work. Those six hundred points grant entry into any course regardless of the suitability of the student for the course. The leaving cert should be more tailored for the universities needs.

I would disagree with 600, maybe 550 plus, but it would be a hell of a lot of hard work. Someone woth the discipline to work that hard will succeed in any course which they want to succeed in.

Hard work is far far more important for success than natural ability. Intelligence is all too often wasted.

BazDel

steddyeddy wrote: »

The fact is universities require a lot more than hard work. A person with a natural aptitude for science is far better to science than someone who just works hard.

Some courses require certain grades in certain subjects already. That is the job of the university. However if all courses had strict requirements that would just cause an even bigger problem. E.g. If people who have done Accounting at LC would be the only ones allowed to do Accounting at 3rd level. That would mean students would have to decide on their college course in forth/fifth year so as to pick the relevant LC subjects.

steddyeddy

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

Presumably this guy would have done mostly science in his leaving. He should also have to do other things, since the leaving cert is not just to guide people to university courses, it is more rounded.

I would say the major reason for the leaving is to get people into college.

ShatterResistant

I can never understand the view that exists that rote learning is the worst case scenario for the education system. If a future doctor had good problem solving skills but can't remember what all the causes/symptoms of a particular disease are, then those problem solving skills are fairly defunct. While problem solving skills are very important do subjects like maths not cater for this i.e. rote learning all the theorems/formulae and then analysing a question and knowing when to apply those theorems.

But thats just me :rolleyes:

steddyeddy

true-or-false wrote: »

So if someone has a natural aptitude for science, and little aptitude for languages, but their dream is to get a degree in French and travel with it, and they're prepared to work their ass of for it, you don't think they should be accepted??

If someone has to work twice as hard, and is willing to, surely that makes them even more deserving of their place?? If they're passing their college exams then what does is matter whether or not they have a natural aptitude?

I should have extended natural aptitude to include a strong interest in the subject. I think interest in a subject is one of the biggest reasons people do well in a given course. If a person has a strong interest in a subject and an aptitude for it they will be far more likely to work hard at that subject.

Duggys Housemate

The statement that anybody of "reasonable" - I assume steadyeddy means average intelligence - can get six hundred points is clearly false. The percentage of people who get six hundred points is < 1 percent. Far less, in fact in 2011 the results were

... 10 students received nine A1s and 141 students achieved six A1s – landing them a perfect 600 points.

I think about 60000 people sat, at all levels, so thats the top 0.2% got 6 A1s and the top 0.01 % got 9 A1s. If you didn't get six to nine A1s in your LC it wasn't because you didn't try hard enough, just as it isn't the case that you are not in the Olympics because you didn't try hard enough, but because you weren't smart enough in one case, and aren't naturally athletic in the other. Don't fool yourself.

In no other field of activity are the top people assumed to have no skill, but mere application. Rubbish.

(And no, I didn't get 600 points either, long prior to 2011)

TheBegotten

The poor aspect of the the leaving certain is thus: it encourages rote learning of the syllabus rather than a comprehensive understanding of the subject in hand. It is orientated towards regurgitation rather than learning and application. In my year, for example, there are 2 geography classes. How many of those students genuinly want a career in geographical areas? Virtually none. People keep it on because it is regarded as an easy points subject. Meanwhile Chemistry has 10 students and class sizes for honours maths get smaller each year.

Duggys Housemate

hooli07 wrote: »

I can never understand the view that exists that rote learning is the worst case scenario for the education system. If a future doctor had good problem solving skills but can't remember what all the causes/symptoms of a particular disease are, then those problem solving skills are fairly defunct. While problem solving skills are very important do subjects like maths not cater for this i.e. rote learning all the theorems/formulae and then analysing a question and knowing when to apply those theorems.

But thats just me :rolleyes:

Exactly, the ability to learn is a form of intelligence. It is what is tested on University Challenge for instance, and it is not creativity. But just because it is not creative, does not make it worthless. David Attenborough's ability to know the latin names of flora, is a form of intelligence.

Duggys Housemate

TheBegotten wrote: »

The poor aspect of the the leaving certain is thus: it encourages rote learning of the syllabus rather than a comprehensive understanding of the subject in hand. It is orientated towards regurgitation rather than learning and application. In my year, for example, there are 2 geography classes. How many of those students genuinly want a career in geographical areas? Virtually none. People keep it on because it is regarded as an easy points subject. Meanwhile Chemistry has 10 students and class sizes for honours maths get smaller each year.

If they did do a geography degee it would be all rote. The point is - rote has its place.

And I did science, in uni, by the way. Engineering which is less rote than most, but I don't sneer at rote learning. In fact I have a crap memory, so I envy those who can learn and "regurgitate".

emzolita

It's an unfair system. Sure, "study, work hard and you can achieve anything" I studied me arse off for 6 years, got all As & Bs in the junior. But on the day of the first exam I took a huge seizure, and was hospitalised. I was put on brain sedatives and had to sit the rest of my exams in bed in Beaumont.
Obviously the studying didn't pay off then, I got 350 points, needed 450.
So I went back to repeat, studied all year again, only to get brain surgery a week before the leaving the 2nd time (obviously didn't do it)
So I think its s very unfair system to base your entire life's education on one exam that will determine your future.

TheBegotten

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

If they did do a geography degee it would be all rote. The point is - rote has its place.

And I did science, in uni, by the way. Engineering which is less rote than most, but I don't sneer at rote learning. In fact I have a crap memory, so I envy those who can learn and "regurgitate".

But my point is that few if any of the aforementioned students want to do a geography related course. I've asked, most want to muddle through an arts degree, but other answers have ranged from marine biology through electrical engineering to BIS. I myself want to do nanoscience, and the idea that someone could get in there with completely irrelevant subjects is...annoying.

Owen_S

Obviously it should be changed - our current system is 14 years of full-time education, the only part of significance being a memory test at the end.

Duggys Housemate

TheBegotten wrote: »

But my point is that few if any of the aforementioned students want to do a geography related course. I've asked, most want to muddle through an arts degree, but other answers have ranged from marine biology through electrical engineering to BIS. I myself want to do nanoscience, and the idea that someone could get in there with completely irrelevant subjects is...annoying.

The system used to allow universities to award a different points system for different subjects, possibly that needs to be brought back.

whatdoicare

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

The system used to allow universities to award a different points system for different subjects, possibly that needs to be brought back.

I think you're right - it would probably work better if the colleges ignored the points system altogether and just focused on what grade the student got in the subjects most relevant to the course they have applied for.

steddyeddy

Duggys Housemate wrote: »

The statement that anybody of "reasonable" - I assume steadyeddy means average intelligence - can get six hundred points is clearly false. The percentage of people who get six hundred points is < 1 percent. Far less, in fact in 2011 the results were

... 10 students received nine A1s and 141 students achieved six A1s – landing them a perfect 600 points.

I think about 60000 people sat, at all levels, so thats the top 0.2% got 6 A1s and the top 0.01 % got 9 A1s. If you didn't get six to nine A1s in your LC it wasn't because you didn't try hard enough, just as it isn't the case that you are not in the Olympics because you didn't try hard enough, but because you weren't smart enough in one case, and aren't naturally athletic in the other. Don't fool yourself.

In no other field of activity are the top people assumed to have no skill, but mere application. Rubbish.

(And no, I didn't get 600 points either, long prior to 2011)

Im not reducing the fanatastic achievment of getting 600 points. Its a fantastic result to get. I certainly think intelligence plays a large part in it but I dont think intelligence is the most important attribute when it comes to the leaving cert. I think the ability to learn is a form of intelligence but all of us have it to some degree. In my opinion encouragement and enviroment and the fact that only a small number of people get 600 points isnt proof that its a test of intelligence. The leaving cert doesnt test for intelligence imho.

A more telling indication of intelligence imo would be a research project or something. Im not saying all this because Im some bitter person who didnt get what he wanted in university. I got into science and I was delighted but there are people who didnt get in who would be better suited than those who did.

whatdoicare

whatdoicare wrote: »

I think you're right - it would probably work better if the colleges ignored the points system altogether and just focused on what grade the student got in the subjects most relevant to the course they have applied for.

I'd have two problems with that:
- it would put immense pressure on people's subject choices (which I think already limits people too much) right down to Junior Cert. Among other issues I think this would worsen the already desperate situation with medicine and some other course choices, where someone with little knowledge of the college choices available to them comes into first year of secondary school thinking they already know what they want.
- I think that the leaving cert course needs to be broader, not more constricted. If only the subjects relevant for the college course were studied (which can often be ambiguous - English for example is crucial for most degrees), then kids would give up on other subjects, and never study them at all and have a far less comprehensive education. It would also penalise people who don't know what they want. I had Science and English on my CAO, and really wasn't sure what I wanted. I'd hate to have given up on one to study the other.

El Siglo

Maybe it's the fact that there are too many subjects to do in the leaving cert and you're jumping from pillar to post. I did seven and had to do Irish and German, I hated both of these subjects. I couldn't do Geography because it clashed with Biology. If people were to do say five subjects but in actual depth with the rote learning combined with the application then it might not be as bad. Also the introduction of some new subjects might help. Geography is supposed to cover all things natural and human in the environment, yet there's no actual GIS done.

mikemac1

So people find it stressful?

Welcome, you are an adult now

Working is stressful, so is living on the dole, so is supporting a family or making a huge decisions like a house purchase.
You'll be dealing with stress your entire life

And you'll learn that you don't have to be the most intelligent to succeed.
It's the hardest worker that counts, hard work beats ability anyday
Nothing more common then a clever student who coasts and then doesn't do so well

GaryIrv93

El Siglo wrote: »

Maybe it's the fact that there are too many subjects to do in the leaving cert and you're jumping from pillar to post. I did seven and had to do Irish and German, I hated both of these subjects. I couldn't do Geography because it clashed with Biology. If people were to do say five subjects but in actual depth with the rote learning combined with the application then it might not be as bad. Also the introduction of some new subjects might help. Geography is supposed to cover all things natural and human in the environment, yet there's no actual GIS done.

I liked Geography until 5th year and then just gradually started hating it. For the LC it got much more stressful with the Field Study, which I had many sleepless nights over, but the worst part was the marking scheme - SRP's. Anything that the examiner considers off track isin't marked - you could right pages and pages of correct information and get maybe 2 SRP's for it all. It's very hard to stick to relevant information to the question asked without realising you're just waffling with irrelevant info, which was extremely hard even for the top students in my year doing Geography. That's what pissed me off most about the subject. They need to sort that part of it out, and countless students I know have complained about how harshly it's marked. Just that alone was a big factor why I began to despise the subject.

GaryIrv93

mikemac1 wrote: »

So people find it stressful?

Welcome, you are an adult now

Working is stressful, so is living on the dole, so is supporting a family or making a huge decisions like a house purchase.
You'll be dealing with stress your entire life

And you'll learn that you don't have to be the most intelligent to succeed.
It's the hardest worker that counts, hard work beats ability anyday
Nothing more common then a clever student who coasts and then doesn't do so well

In fairness a lot of school stress is brought on by teachers and parents placing far too much emphasis on their students scoring above average, just for the sheer hell of it in many cases. Many adults, who've finished their (then easier) Leaving Certs years ago havn't the slightest clue how stressful it is to be a LC student nowadays. Especially now due to the recession, many students feel like they're overworking themselves to keep their parents and teachers happy, not for their own benefit. And the attitide of ''life is stressful, tough, so deal with it'' certainly doesn't help. Young people can only take so much stress before they take steps to relieve it, such as drugs, drinking, self-harm, you name it.

mikemac1

GaryIrv93 wrote: »

Many adults, who've finished their (then easier) Leaving Certs years ago havn't the slightest clue how stressful it is to be a LC student nowadays.

There have been posts about grade inflation and dumbing down subjects on this thread

You're the first I've seen that thinks the LC is more difficult now then it has ever been

But that doesn't matter realy, every generation thinks they have it worst

One day your kids/nieces/nephews will tell you their LC is horrendous and you had it easy

GaryIrv93

mikemac1 wrote: »

There have been posts about grade inflation and dumbing down subjects on this thread

You're the first I've seen that thinks the LC is more difficult now then it has ever been

But that doesn't matter realy, every generation thinks they have it worst

One day your kids/nieces/nephews will tell you their LC is horrendous and you had it easy

What I'm saying is years ago people doing the LC didn't have to worry about points, like you do now.

I'd say also that certainly a lot more pressure is put on students nowadays due to the economic downturn.

The LC will probably change greatly in future years - more and more people are calling for adjustments or complete overhalls of it.

of course we had to worry about points too

JohnMarston

mikemac1 wrote: »

There have been posts about grade inflation and dumbing down subjects on this thread

You're the first I've seen that thinks the LC is more difficult now then it has ever been

But that doesn't matter realy, every generation thinks they have it worst

One day your kids/nieces/nephews will tell you their LC is horrendous and you had it easy

There has never been as much competition for 3rd level places as there is now. The more students that apply for any one course, the more the point requirement goes up for that course the next year.
The higher the point & grade requirements go up, the more stress it puts on the student to do even better then their fellow classmates.

Factor into that the availability of more gadgets & distractions outside of school hours, things that rob our time instead of saving it.

I fear that trend will only worsen, giving, as you put it, future generations of students a chance to boast that they have it tougher than the previous one.

mikemac1

GaryIrv93 wrote: »

What I'm saying is years ago people doing the LC didn't have to worry about points, like you do now.

Over a decade since I did it and you seem to know more about the system then the people who were there at the time

GaryIrv93

bluewolf wrote: »

of course we had to worry about points too

Depends on when you did you Leaving Cert. I thought the points system was only introduced in relatively recent years?

FloatingVoter

GaryIrv93 wrote: »

Depends on when you did you Leaving Cert. I thought the points system was only introduced in relatively recent years?

I did the LC in 1992 and the points system was well entrenched even then.

11 years ago for me

mikemac1

GaryIrv93 wrote: »

Depends on when you did you Leaving Cert. I thought the points system was only introduced in relatively recent years?

It was there at the beginning of the nineties.
Twenty years ago.

And if you failed Irish you failed the entire LC

But you're telling the people who did it that you know more about the system then they do

Jester252

I would prefer something like the A-levels in England. Not only would you have a system that gives a high level of education. In the first year of college most for the subjects are to make sure everyone is on the same level as most people would have done bad on the LC in subjects important to their course now because they were spending time doing work for a subject that they are never going to use again outside the LC. While 5th year won't know what they what to do in the future. They will have some sense of what areas they do what to work in.

GaryIrv93

mikemac1 wrote: »

It was there at the beginning of the nineties.
Twenty years ago.

And if you failed Irish you failed the entire LC

But you're telling the people who did it that you know more about the system then they do

I'm not saying in any way that I know more, however both my parents did their Leavings over 27 years ago, and so have a number of friend's parents, and other relatives. They said that there was no points system back then, that you simply needed to get the right grades needed for your college course.

frozenfrozen

What annoys me the most about all of this - In class I regularly ask a question about the topic and then get a response either from another student or the teacher to the effect of "It's not on our course so it's irrelevant."

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

mikemac1 wrote: »

It was there at the beginning of the nineties.
Twenty years ago.

And if you failed Irish you failed the entire LC

But you're telling the people who did it that you know more about the system then they do

That bit was long gone before the 90s.

In fairness, as a LC student, he probably knows more abotu it now than most of us who did it years ago.

Scanlas The 2nd

I think we should be proud of our LC overall, it's a good system. I've yet to hear better alternatives. People complaining about stress is ridiculous, resources are limited, meaning their will always be competition, the best way of dealing with the stress is psychological and mindfulness.

St.Spodo

The main problem with the Leaving Cert is that it doesn't distinguish between learning and memorising. The skills of critical thinking and challenging ideas aren't honed by exams which encourage students to learn by rote, regurgitate and then forget most of it forever by the time they're on holidays. I think the system needs to be significantly altered.

Ficheall

St.Spodo wrote: »

The main problem with the Leaving Cert is that it doesn't distinguish between learning and memorising. The skills of critical thinking and challenging ideas aren't honed by exams which encourage students to learn by rote, regurgitate and then forget most of it forever by the time they're on holidays.

The same could be said of college...

mikemac1

Ikky Poo2 wrote: »

In fairness, as a LC student, he probably knows more abotu it now than most of us who did it years ago.

Well he thinks twenty years ago is relatively recent and the points system didn't exist in nineties

frozenfrozen

Would I be alone in wanting my doctor to have got say 400 points in their leaving cert and had to work through alternative channels to become a doctor, rather than someone who got 600 points and then just did medicine because they could.

FloatingVoter

frozenfrozen wrote: »

Would I be alone in wanting my doctor to have got say 400 points in their leaving cert and had to work through alternative channels to become a doctor, rather than someone who got 600 points and then just did medicine because they could.

I'd prefer if my GP actually wanted to be a doctor in the first place. His / her knowledge of Irish grammar isn't an issue for me.

GaryIrv93

mikemac1 wrote: »

Well he thinks twenty years ago is relatively recent and the points system didn't exist in nineties

It was a guess. Apologies for not knowing what year points were introduced, but I never said that I knew more about the education system than you or anyone else who did their Leavings back then.

mikemac1

Many adults, who've finished their (then easier) Leaving Certs

But you know about the difficulty of the exams back then

partyatmygaff

frozenfrozen wrote: »

Would I be alone in wanting my doctor to have got say 400 points in their leaving cert and had to work through alternative channels to become a doctor, rather than someone who got 600 points and then just did medicine because they could.

I don't think it makes a huge difference. Either way requires a lot of determination. Doing well in your HPAT and LC or getting a 2.1 in a degree and then going through the hassle of the GAMSAT and graduate medicine is a lot of work.

At the end of the day how someone got in to their course isn't very important. How they actually do in their course makes all the difference.