Shake-up to cost €10m per year to implement

Education Minister Ruairi Quinn unveiled the most radical shake-up of the Junior Certificate in a generation by outlining how the “high stakes exam” will be scrapped by 2017.

The plan adopts many of the elements contained in a National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) document last year but goes further, with the minister claiming it was not a cost-saving exercise and will instead cost his department €10m a year to implement.

The minister told the NCCA conference in Dublin yesterday that the new plan would “liberate teachers” and sought to reassure parents there will be “clear and unambiguous standards” for how their children will be assessed.