Parents and public must accept ‘challenging’ exams

PARENTS and the public, generally, must accept the Leaving Certificate has to challenge students rather than react angrily to difficult exam papers, says the head of the agency that will lead its overhaul.

The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) is already finalising changes to the Junior Certificate cycle that should see students rely more for their marks on project, portfolio and other tests of their abilities.

But, under proposals in the debate on refocusing the Leaving Certificate, such assessments could also be extended to students who are in the final two years of second level education.

NCCA chief executive Anne Looney said the public has come to value the predictability in the exam system but that has to be looked at again.

“Every June, the public comment in the newspapers on the predictable [exam] paper is that it’s a good one and the comment on the unpredictable or a new approach is that it was a bad paper,” she said.

“But then, back in the business page, somebody is saying that what’s good is creative and unpredictable. The public debate needs to focus on this intolerable tension because we can’t have it every way,” Ms Looney said.

All Leaving Certificate students will be examined for the first time next year in new Project Maths syllabus.

“The new maths papers are going to test students’ ability to deal with the unpredictable. We’re going to have to see that as a really good paper instead of [having] a wave of criticism because it wasn’t predictable,” Ms Looney said.

In the discussion paper published ahead of a NCCA/Higher Education Authority conference about the transition from second to third level, Prof Áine Hyland has suggested a number of possible Leaving Certificate reforms. They would include projects, portfolios and other assignments completed in non-exam conditions.

“Essays and open book questions answered in supervised classroom conditions and externally marked might also be introduced. Instead of requiring students to sit one written exam at the end of the final year, two or more sittings at different points throughout the two-year senior cycle could be an option,” she wrote.

The State Examinations Commission said last night that the exams are based on syllabi developed by the NCCA and approved by the education minister.

“The Irish State exam system is a European leader in the transparency of the system through the publication of examination papers, marking schemes and the facility for Leaving Certificate candidates to view their scripts after the examinations have taken place,” a spokesperson said.

Prof Hyland also makes a case for greater use of new technologies, such as online submission of essays written under supervision or computer-marked multiple choice questions.