30,000 Junior Cert students to avoid losing out on marks

More than 30,000 Junior Certificate students taught by teachers on industrial action should now be able to complete an English test next month and avoid missing out on marks.

The development comes as a result of the Department of Education removing a link between the test, worth 10% of marks in Junior Certificate English, and a separate classroom-based assessment (CBA) which Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI) refuse to undertake with their students.

While the change requires a formal revision to Department of Education instructions a year ago that students could only do the assessment task if they had completed the CBA, that change is expected to be happen this week.

A spokesperson for Education Minister Richard Bruton confirmed this after the State Examinations Commission (SEC) yesterday issued guidance spelling out the procedure for schools to facilitate the assessment task.

It appears to remove any potential barrier to students doing the assessment task, around which uncertainty had been worrying students and their parents since beginning third-year last September.

The ASTI’s only response was to say that the new SEC guidance would be considered by its 23-member standing committee, which meets on Thursday and Friday.

English is the first subject in which revised assessments are being introduced, with students of non-ASTI teachers already having completed the assessment task in December.

But the ASTI’s members voted to reject joining the Teachers’ Union of Ireland and complying with the junior cycle reforms, in a vote covering proposals to resolve this and two pay disputes a month ago.

The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) told schools before Christmas that students who had not completed the CBA and assessment task could now do so by the end of March, and in the last week of April, respectively.

In further advice issued yesterday, the SEC said it is now not necessary for a student’s work in the CBA to have been assessed by their teacher, in order for the assessment task to be undertaken.

“The completion of the assessment task is a separate activity and will be marked by the SEC,” a commission spokesperson said.

The SEC said the arrangements for the operation and management of the assessment task are in line with those for externally-assessed coursework in subjects such as Junior Certificate science, or Leaving Certificate history and geography.

“The class teacher role in relation to the completion of the assessment task is to engage with their students in relation to the NCCA stimulus material and questions in relation to the task, and then to supervise the class in completing the SEC-provided booklet,” the guidance document states.

Crucially, it says, class teachers have no role in marking this work.

Like the CBA, which students will not now have to be marked on, the assessment task is based around a collection of texts which students will have read during the three-year junior cycle in English.

While students may now compete for all available marks in Junior Certificate English, non-completion of the two CBAs by those taught by ASTI members will be reflected in the Junior Cycle Profile of Achievement, which will summarise in-school performance as well as outcomes in the State examination.