New Leaving Cert timetable aims to take pressure off students

The Leaving Certificate timetable is to be substantially redrawn to take the pressure off students.

Feedback from students who took the examination in recent years has revealed that many find the frontloading of major subjects such as English, Irish and maths puts an enormous strain on them and leaves them unable to revise for other subjects.

The State Examinations Commission has agreed to implement a fundamental rescheduling of examinations in the first week of the timetable. This could see a major subject like English being paired with a science subject.

This will allow students to take a mix of examinations each day incorporating subjects which require essay type answers and subjects which demand a mathematic or scientific perspective.

Full details of the new exams timetable are being finalised by the State Examinations Commission and will issued to schools in coming weeks.

Minister for Education Mary Hanafin said: "The days of sitting writing non-stop for six hours 20 minutes in those first few days will be gone. The one thing that Leaving Certificate student indicated to me is that there was too much pressure on the first three days of the exam. There was too much time spent writing and they were literally exhausted at the end of the week."

She added: "I have arranged that next year's timetable will be revamped for the first time in years. There will be a combination of a heavy writing subject and a mathematical one - perhaps a science subject. It will certainly take the pressure off."

Ms Hanafin also said she had asked the State Examinations Commission to look at the possible scheduling of popular exams such as English paper 1 in May to lessen the burden caused by the June timetable.

She also said that the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) was looking at introducing a second component to all Leaving Certificate subjects which would lessen the pressure in June.

"This will have the benefit of reducing the stressful impact on students of a single high stakes terminal examination," the Minister said. "Great progress is being made by the NCCA and I expect students to see the outcome in the coming years."