AS LEAVING Certificate students prepare to sit tomorrow's written music paper, they will be hoping that the paper that greets them is considerably better than the practical music test which they sat in May.
Apart from a number of glaring errors in the paper itself supervisors were given two separate starting times for the examination though, in some centres, no instructions at all were received.
In fact, some centres almost received no examination papers at all.
The Department has since received a report on the examination from the Post Primary Music Teachers' Association, relating both to the administration of the examination and specific questions on the higher level paper in particular.
"There were a lob of problems with it and teachers right around the country were very unhappy with it," Ms Louise O'Connell, chairperson of the Post Primary Music Teachers' Association, said.
"The problems encountered, during the Leaving Certificate aural examination have been reported to the Department by an internal memo from the teachers' association." The association, she said, was satisfied that the Department had officially recognised the concerns of teachers and had taken appropriate measures' to deal with the matter.
The administration of the examination was a particular point of concern. The instructions for superintendents gave two different times for the commencement of the examination (2 p.m. and 2.30 p.m.), though some centres did not receive any instructions at all, with unfortunate repercussions for the candidates.
In fact, some centres didn't initially receive papers the day before the exam was due to go ahead and, in one case, a courier was sent down with the papers later in the day to ensure that the exam could go ahead as scheduled.
This year's aural exam was the first under what are termed the interim arrangements" for Leaving Certificate music. These permitted changes to the music exams before the introduction of the new syllabus in 1997, to improve access to music and encourage students to take what had previously been perceived as a difficult subject.
Significantly, the paper presented to students in the aural examination differed greatly from the sample papers distributed to teachers earlier in the year.
"The reaction from the teachers point of view is that they feel they have been let down," says Sister Anne O'Flanagan, a teacher in Mercy College, Moate, Co Westmeath, and a representative of the principals and management on the NCCA course committee.
"Music teachers are professionals and should be treated accordingly. A sample paper arrived in schools from the Department and, generally, when a sample paper arrives at the school you take that as the pattern.
"The actual paper wasn't a reflection of what we were led to believe would appear on it from the sample paper," she says.
For a start, the paper was much more difficult and demanding than expected. Question 3, one of the new questions, was especially difficult but was made even more so by the Department's errors. Students were to have heard a score and were to be given a copy of the score to read along with the tape. Unfortunately, not all supervisors were given instructions to hand out copies of the score to students.
Also, the score pages were printed on different sides of a single sheet of paper rather than facing each other, so that students had to keep turning the sheet to follow the score. Finally the pages' were numbered wrongly to begin with, so that the second half of the score was marked "P.12" while the first half was marked "P. 13".
There are two other specific points about which teachers are understood to be unhappy.
. Question 3(b) asked students to identify two techniques on bars 8 to 11 of a played extract. Difficulties were created by the fact that the bars had not been numbered.
. Question 5(d) asked students to identify the period from which a song, known as a lied, came. The choices given were impressionist, classical, modern or baroque. Unfortunately, the lied does not come from any of these periods since it is a well recognised composition from the romantic era.
Surreally, students were then asked to give a reason for their answer.
The whole situation is particularly unfortunate given the amount of work that went into the formulation of the "interim arrangements" for the Leaving Certificate music examination.
The Minister took note of the fact that the Department needed to improve access to Leaving Certificate music and teachers were delighted," Mr O'Connell says. "The idea was to give greater access to students who had the received idea that music was too, difficult, and it would have succeeded if the test paper had been similar to the sample questions."
Ms O'Connell expressed optimism that this year's exam was a minor hitch in an otherwise positive series of proposed changes and reassured students that their interests were being looked after, but the problems with this year's aural examination mean that considerable efforts must be made to restore the good will of teachers built up during in service training.
A spokesperson for the Department of Education confirmed that there was "a small amount of confusion about starting times in some centres" but he said the centres were able to cope with this and that all centres received examination papers. "There was a small number of minor errors on the insert pages and the wording," he said.
"These issues have been discussed at the pre marking conference and they will be carefully monitored during the marking process to ensure that no students will be at a disadvantage.