'You can't really do it online' - The 'emotional rollercoaster' of sixth year during Covid
Natasha Myers and Tyler O'Sullivan receiving a school ethos award and ‘Student of the Year’ respectively from Killorglin Community College, Killorglin, Co. Kerry. They appreciated some of the little things their school did, like encouraging them to get outside and get fresh air during February. Photo: Domnick Walsh
“It’s been one emotional rollercoaster, to be honest with you.”
That’s how Arron Callanan from Ballyvolane, Cork, a student at St Aidan's on Dublin Hill describes being a sixth-year during a pandemic.
Today, Leaving Cert students finish the last of the in-school assessments that will help to form the basis of their accredited grades. It also marks the start of the accredited grades process, during which teachers will calculate their preliminary estimates.
For Arron, now is the time to "knuckle down" with the study before the Leaving Cert exams begin on June 9. When he finishes school, he wants to study biological and chemical sciences at University College Cork (UCC).
“The Government said that they were going to be advising Leaving Cert students to quarantine for two weeks,” he laughed. “I was just thinking ‘sure, we’re all going to be doing that anyway.’ I have no time to be going outside and partying on. It’s all study.”
Like many students, he has opted for a mix of accredited grades and sitting exams. “For history now, I really have a keen interest in it. My teacher’s been training me to sit that history exam so I really want to sit that paper.”
Fellow St Aidan’s student Bronwen Hyland, from Upper Glanmire, also found certain parts of sixth year during the pandemic tough. “It was a bit harder to study at home, when you are cooped up all day. We can't even have our graduation or anything because of Covid, things like that. It took a lot out of people.”
Inspired by the pandemic, she wants to study medicine when she finishes school. "I'd love to have been able to help.
She has opted to sit most of her exams. “The amendments that they’ve made have taken a huge weight off all our shoulders.”
While it might be an unusual year, some of the familiar nerves associated with the Leaving Cert remain. “I worry about blanking and things like that when I go in to the exam but I know myself that if I’m putting the work in, hopefully they will go my way. But I’m getting turns in my stomach now thinking about them, I’m very nervous.”
Natasha Myers and Tyler O’Sullivan are sixth year students at Killorglin Community College, Killorglin, Kerry. The day they spoke to the Examiner, they were awarded by their school, with Tyler receiving ‘Student of the Year’ and Natasha receiving a school ethos award.
Little things the school did, like encouraging them to get outside and get fresh air during February, helped students a lot during the closures, according to Natasha, who is from Castlemaine.
"I think a lot of us were inside, online all day in front of a laptop, trying to get homework done in the evenings, trying to get a bit of study done. And then you were back up and at it again in the morning."
"For subjects like maths, you need to have your teacher beside you, you need to have your friends so you can ask them how they are doing something. You can't really do that online in the same way."
People didn’t really realise the stress attached to some of the assessments for the accredited grades, according to Tyler O’Sullivan, Killorglin. “Our minds will be clearer with the assessments done. I think people thought ‘oh it’s only an assessment, you are still sitting the Leaving Cert’.
“But they were more than that. They are a cushion, just in case the papers don’t go our way we have something to fall on.”
“We really have been working the whole way through sixth year, not just the last three months. The next couple of weeks, it’s really time to just put my head down and get stuck in the books.”
Does she think continuous assessment would work well for future Leaving Cert assessments? “I think definitely, but the way it was this year was very squished. I had three exams on one day, that was so hard to study for. But if they had a timetable that covered the whole sixth-year calendar. You know, one final exam in June for a subject you’ve worked on for two years, that shouldn’t finalise your ability.”
Do they worry about the possibility of having to quarantine during the exams? “We’re going to try and keep out that negative energy, we're just dealing with it as it comes. We can't do anything about that situation, and really the only thing we can do is study now, and hope we can sit the exams."
Between now and May 28, teachers will prepare the preliminary marks for students' accredited grades. Teachers have been instructed to generate an accredited grade for every student in every subject in case they do not get the chance to sit the exam.
The in-school alignment phase of the process begins during the last week in May, with data to be submitted to the State Exams Commission by the beginning of June. Leaving Cert exams are due to begin on Wednesday, June 9.
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