Decision time

Technical drawing is a good subject for budding engineers - especially girls.

Aspiring engineers, architects and construction workers have long known that technical drawing is a useful choice for Leaving Certificate. One in 12 students took the two technical-drawing papers last year, the overwhelming majority of them male.

Students of technical drawing are offered a choice of Paper 2 exams: engineering applications or building applications. Eighty per cent of students opt for the latter. About half of technical-drawing students take the subject at higher level.

"Technical drawing has a vocational value for students who hope to work in the building sector," says teacher John O'Sullivan. "However, it contributes to a broad, balanced and general education, as it develops the vital skills of spatial reasoning and visualisation."

Spatial reasoning has wide applications. As well as supporting mathematical and scientific ability, graphic artists, computer-aided- design specialists and other designers need a well-developed spatial awareness. O'Sullivan, who teaches at Mountgarrett CBS, in Wexford, hopes more girls will take an interest in the subject. "Of the small number of girls that take the subject each year, their results are consistently equal to those of the male students," he says. The subject is rarely available in girls' schools, however, so many female students have to pursue the subject independently.

The 80 per cent of technical- drawing students who specialise in building applications can expect to cover such subjects as mining geometry and earthworks geometry, as well as the geometric principles at play in high-profile structures such as Sydney Opera House. Common to all technical-drawing students is the study of plain and solid geometry.

The exam papers, according to O'Sullivan, follow a fairly predictable format every year, and the subject rewards students who study the exam papers throughout senior cycle.

"The results for technical-drawing students are consistently good," says O'Sullivan. "At higher level 75 per cent of students get honours every year, and 15 per cent get As. For students with a decent aptitude for maths and science, technical drawing is well worth investigation."

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