Dr Colman Noctor: Leaving Cert students, there is more than one way to reach your goal
"Up to about eight years ago, 350 points in your Leaving Cert was 'average' and considered a decent result. But now it seems 500 points is the new target. Why has this happened?"
I have accompanied young people through their Leaving Cert journey for over 20 years and the examination is always a stressful time, even for the most complacent students. During 'the Covid years', the introduction of predicted grades helped reduce the anxiety levels of many students, as the results didn't come down to one exam. However, this year, with the reintroduction of the traditional format, anxiety levels are back up to pre-Covid levels.
I spoke to a sixth-year class recently and the stress in the room was palpable. It was a stark reminder of the Leaving Cert's psychological impact on young people. They told me that their anxiety had been around for months, and they did not expect it to subside until the college offers arrived in mid-August.
The point is raised year on year about how a cost-benefit analysis of the examination process needs to happen because of its impact on young people. Despite the opportunity of the forced pause brought about by Covid, it seems that the government and policymakers are just not listening.
Some might suggest that taking a person-based approach to the Leaving Cert is more evidence of adults attempting to remove stress from young people's lives and students' high-stress levels are symptomatic of their lack of resilience. But I disagree. The stress caused by this exam is not getting worse because young people are less able - it is because its perceived importance has hugely increased in recent years.
It is important to recognise the shift in expectation and pressure. Up to about eight years ago, 350 points in your Leaving Cert was 'average' and considered a decent result. But now it seems 500 points is the new target. Why has this happened? Some might blame CAO point inflation, but I see it as a reflection of the meteoric rise in our collective expectations of our children and the exponential pressure on the school and family systems to produce 'results'.
Over the last ten years, our expectations of young people have continued to rise, which has had a significant effect on their mental health. Adolescence has become an 'apprenticeship for adulthood'. Adults now seem to view all adolescent activities as an 'investment', which must produce a 'pay-off' in adulthood, resulting in more and more children expressing higher levels of stress and far fewer accounts of carelessness and joy.
This shift in focus is evident in the language we use. An example of this is how the word 'average' has become synonymous with 'substandard'. Average by its definition is where most of us will be, so if we make average substandard, then we consign the majority of people to a position of discontent.
So why has this expectation shift happened? I believe it's a combination of several factors.
Firstly, we now live in a hyper-comparative culture fuelled by social media. So, when someone is taking a state exam, they will be acutely aware of how much preparation others are doing and know their results will be shared online. This exposure cranks up the pressure to perform. The size of the audience who will scrutinise your performance is nearly always a factor in the perceived stress of the task.
Secondly, because most people have access to the biggest library in the world at their fingertips, it's believed there can be no excuse for underperforming. If you have access to these resources but fail to perform, then it must be due to laziness or inability, two unflattering outcomes.
Thirdly, the level of investment in our children has changed in recent years. The finances and time that goes into grinds, tuition fees, Irish college and so on mean there is an expected 'return' on these investments. Parents, sometimes unwittingly, can add to the pressure that young people are experiencing. The expectation that every student will be progressing to third-level education and the academic snobbery around what university or third-level course you end up doing is also an unspoken pressure. The number of students enrolled in third-level institutions rose from 209,000 in 2014 to 245,000 in 2020, an increase of 6% from the previous year. According to the Central Statistics Office, rates of third-level education in Ireland are higher than the EU average, with 58% of 25-34-year-olds holding a tertiary level qualification in 2020, compared with an EU average of 41%.
Fourthly, there is the 'tyranny of choice' regarding third-level courses. When I left school in the mid-90s, my results record suggested that the options of medicine or law were not in the offing. With those options ruled out, I had the choice of a 'trade', joining 'the bank', becoming a Garda, nurse or fireman, or studying arts, business/ hospitality or computers. It was a pretty limited set of choices compared to what is on offer now. As it happened, I was too short to join the Gardai, too scared to be a fireman and I was useless with my hands, so a trade was a non-runner. Also, as I was not considered 'academic', college or university was not advisable, so I decided to do mental health nursing.
Over the following 20 years, I completed a graduate diploma, master's degree and a doctorate in mental health. The sea change was that I finally got to study something that interested me, revealing that the 'not academic' label was not accurate - I just didn't feel motivated by the academic material that was on offer.
I have taught mental health nursing programmes in UCD, TCD and more recently, in the newly established SETU. But if I were applying to do mental health nursing today, I would not get in based on my 1995 Leaving Cert results. I achieved 310 points, which my parents and I were delighted with, considering how little study I did in preparation for the exam. But it would still fall short of the 441 points needed to do mental health nursing in 2022.
Surely achieving a CAO point target that you set yourself is not an accurate example of success. Likewise, falling short of that target by a small number of points is not indicative of failure. Also, one's appetite and suitability for a chosen career should be considered and not just someone's ability to perform in an exam.
Many sixth-year students I've spoken to believe that achieving '9/10' of their pre-set goals is a success. But with such a narrow window of success, it means that everything below '9' is a failure. This outlook lacks perspective and does not consider success and failure to exist on a continuum with varying degrees of success and failure.
Before meeting the sixth-year students last week, I had planned to do a talk on maintaining well-being in the build-up to the upcoming exams. But when I entered the room, it was clear that many of these students would much prefer to use the hour to revise potential exam material than be stuck in a room with me talking about 'wellbeing'. So rather than lecturing them about the importance of taking regular breaks, getting a good night's sleep and going for walks, I went off script to give some perspective. I explained that the amount of stress created by this exam process does not reflect its lifelong importance and reassured them that there were many ways to achieve the career of your choice. I told them not to despair if things don't go the way they wanted and reminded them of the 'sat nav principle': just because you miss a turn doesn't mean that your destination has to change, only the route'.
The students listened to what I said and asked follow-up questions, but I expect the Leaving Cert will remain one of the most significant events in their life because the rest of the world is telling them so. However, if they eventually find themselves in a career they enjoy, perhaps they will look back and see how their worldview has changed in time. Or even better, they will be reminiscing to the young person about how much easier they have it now as they explain as they were one of the last groups to do the dreaded Leaving Cert.
Dr Colman Noctor is a child psychotherapist
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