With the end of the Leaving and Junior Cert exams last week, many students will be reappraising their CAO options in the run-up to the final "change of mind" deadline next Tuesday. There should be a careful reflection on choices. Too often many rush into college options which do not suit their particular skills.
The high drop-out rates across third-level are worth bearing in mind. Over 20 per cent of students drop out of some of our universities and the rates are still higher in many of the institutes of technology, despite great efforts by many colleges to address the issue.
Students will have to wait until the Leaving Cert results in mid-August before they know the courses for which they are eligible. This year's exam season was an eventful one with the State Examinations Commission holding operational responsibility for the first time. Running the exams is a huge logistical challenge with more than 110,000 students taking 31 different subjects at Junior and Leaving Cert level. It is estimated that over 800,000 separate exam components (including scripts, aural and oral exams) are examined by the 3,000-plus examiners.
The potential for something to go wrong is obvious. For all that, the commission will be disappointed at the scale of the problems. It has acknowledged that a question on the higher-level Leaving Cert chemistry paper was not on the syllabus. Aspects of the higher-level maths paper at Leaving Cert were also said by teachers to be unfair to students. Technical problems and proofing errors were identified in several other papers.
The decision to set a question in the chemistry exam, which was not on the course, represented a very serious lapse. Students who have worked diligently for their exam are entitled to believe that the paper will be set in a professional and proper manner. It is not enough for the commission to say that students who answered this question will not be disadvantaged.
It would be useful to hear from the chief examiner in the subject as to how this error was made and slipped unnoticed through the various checks. The chief examiner in maths might also explain the problems with the higher-level maths paper and he/she should address how a paper - roundly criticised as much too tough - was placed before students.
The establishment of the commission means that the Minister for Education no longer has day-to day responsibility for the operation of the exams. Now that the commission has this responsibility, it should account for itself fully to the public. The 57,000 Leaving Cert students, their teachers and parents deserve nothing less.