CSPE Test

1huge1

all the leaving certh students who just did the honour maths are hoping for this

there all saying it was to hard

Irishstabber

Yea and so was the JC higher paper :mad: ...not as bad a situation as the LC though

Call Me Jimmy

it is 100% true, the quotas are there for a damn good reason! in the end you will get what you deserve, because if the paper is (generally) too hard then marks will be given easier, if the paper is too easy (in being so would make you seem better than you are) the marks are very strict. Understand that they can't take marks away from a specific answer that is correct. The marking scheme comes into play (in maths) if you havent got 10/10 on the question. But if you say got 7/10 and they see u havent actually given the answer in the exact way you were supposed to (or something like that) then you could be down to 3/10. Bottom line is you get what u deserve

Irishstabber

Hey, since the maths paper was hard and they have this sh**ty quota thing can they give you a B for eg if you got 65% as they can if you got 92% and too many got an A???

Fobia

That's the idea irishstabber, the point is that it doesn't matter how hard or easy a paper is, you're competing with other students rather than the paper.

I think you're all getting way too worked up about this, the chances of you going down a grade because there were too many A's are very slim I'd imagine.

And PurpleFistMixer: I heard it from my teachers, and then from my vice-principal.....

Strokesa

Big Ears wrote:

That was an extremly easy question , surely you at least know Bertie is the leader of Fianna Fail .

Nope

newgrange

It's not a quota as such, it's a bell curve that results fit into. Search Google Images for 'bell curve' and you will see the shape the graph should be. This is not unique to the Irish education system.

As correcting goes on, they take samples of the marks from all over the country, and to make the results fit the curve more closely (minor variations don't matter) a marking scheme may be adjusted in one way or another.

As a small example, say if in History, the original marking scheme wanted 5 well explained points for full marks on a topic, and after every examiner had corrected their first 100 papers, everyone was getting really high marks in the 'write a paragraph about a Renaissance painter' question, then it might be adjusted to need 6 good points to get the full marks. This happens in examinations all over the world, otherwise you cannot maintain standards within the exam., and there would be 'easy' years compared to others. 'Oh they all got As in 199*, but very few in 199*, so a 199* Leaving Cert. is better than a 199* one'.

*MmmPie*

Strokesa wrote:

Nope

Lol how did you not know that Strokesa?

Victor

Call Me Jimmy wrote:

it is 100% true, the quotas are there for a damn good reason! in the end you will get what you deserve, because if the paper is (generally) too hard then marks will be given easier, if the paper is too easy (in being so would make you seem better than you are) the marks are very strict. Understand that they can't take marks away from a specific answer that is correct. The marking scheme comes into play (in maths) if you havent got 10/10 on the question. But if you say got 7/10 and they see u havent actually given the answer in the exact way you were supposed to (or something like that) then you could be down to 3/10. Bottom line is you get what u deserve

I understand this is largely how it is, however a 7/10 would probably only drop to a 6 or 5. It would specificly drop on a point where some people made the extra effort to explain they knew what they were talking about.

Strokesa

*MmmPie* wrote:

Lol how did you not know that Strokesa?

Im not really sure. I just have no interest what so ever in politics and i think i tune out whenever i hear anything about political parties or anything...
But im not proud of the fact that i didnt no...i amnt completely stupid ok?I do know some important things...
I know who the president of ireland is

PurpleFistMixer

Sure they want to maintain standards in the exams and keep them fair in terms of difficulty, but what if it's just a random occurance that one year has a greater number of exceptional people? Or a greater number of people that fail? They shouldn't be enforcing the same shape every single year, it seems stupid and counter productive to actually assessing the education system.

I mean, they say whatever percentage of people fail maths every year, but what happens if they're dumbing down the paper (which seems moderately possible) and nobody has noticed that there's something wrong with how they're teaching maths/there's a stupid epidemic going around, because they just adjust the marks? I know it's a kind of general, probably irrelevant to us the JC students point, but it just strikes me as stupid that they have to maintain the same curve every single year.

Or maybe I'm just angry at the thought that my marks could be messed with just to fit into some pre-determined quota. Makes me feel helpless and I think my anger is justified.

*MmmPie*

Strokesa wrote:

But im not proud of the fact that i didnt no...i amnt completely stupid ok?I do know some important things...
I know who the president of ireland is

Lol fair enough

Brian017

But the President mainly has a representive role, the Taoiseach actually runs the country. Thus it could be argued that the Toaiseach is an more important thing to know.

Irishstabber

Bertie was on the paper too...Hey and dont forget that the misses is the head of the armed forces too. P**s her off and we'll have a coup on our little island :rolleyes:

Strokesa

Brian017 wrote:

But the President mainly has a representive role, the Taoiseach actually runs the country. Thus it could be argued that the Toaiseach is an more important thing to know.

I knew Bertie Aherne was the taoiseach i just didnt no his party!!!
Omg i feel so stupid now...

Fobia

Strokesa wrote:

Omg i feel so stupid now...

Don't worry about it, on election day, just vote Green party

Brian017

He can't vote yet.

modular

Fobia never mentioned which voting day.

Irishstabber

Bloody greens...trever seargent ahhh...save the world, omg so annoying

Raphael

I'm pretty sure that's a she

Strokesa

Its a she!

Rozabeez

Strokesa wrote:

Im not really sure. I just have no interest what so ever in politics and i think i tune out whenever i hear anything about political parties or anything...
But im not proud of the fact that i didnt no...i amnt completely stupid ok?I do know some important things...
I know who the president of ireland is

Hey dont worry about it....I guessed all those ones!

Fobia

Irishstabber wrote:

Bloody greens...trever seargent ahhh...save the world, omg so annoying

I take it you don't want to save the world then?

PurpleFistMixer

Yeah god damn world!
Always hitting me in the face when I fall over.


I don't know much about politics and I'll educate myself before I vote, but at my current state of knowledge I'd be inclined to go green.

Irishstabber

Fobia wrote:

I take it you don't want to save the world then?

Basically I view Irish politics as pure CR*P....honestly the only interesting times is when the General Election comes around or another scandal appears...Because of this I wont be a politician(I was going to be one )

Strokesa

Rozabeez wrote:

Hey dont worry about it....I guessed all those ones!

Finally....i was starting to think i was the only one...

Rozabeez

I dont know or care about politics, I just made myself look interested and opinionated in the rest of the exam.

Fobia

I don't know much about politics either, but I've met Bertie Ahern (at the Galway races!), and I wouldn't trust the man as far as I can throw him, same is true for most politicians I hear/see on tv. Enough of this anyways, this is about CSPE, and we all know the P stands for pboring. I'll miss the dos.

Victor

PurpleFistMixer wrote:

Sure they want to maintain standards in the exams and keep them fair in terms of difficulty, but what if it's just a random occurance that one year has a greater number of exceptional people?

Unlikely in a sample size of ~30,000. The percentages do vary from year to year and from paper to paper.

PurpleFistMixer wrote:

Or maybe I'm just angry at the thought that my marks could be messed with just to fit into some pre-determined quota. Makes me feel helpless and I think my anger is justified.

Don't worry, within reason, you will be fairly judged.

funky_buddah

A freakin' gerbil could have done that test!