Helping juniors to stay the course

THERE are three variations of the Leaving Certificate on offer but only one Junior Certificate.

However, there is an intervention which is aimed at students who may not have the basic knowledge and skills needed to cope in second level or who may have difficulties with social interaction or difficulties with moving from the integrated pupil-centred approach at primary level to the subject-centred approach at second level.

The Junior Cert Elementary Programme, which has been in gestation for the past 17 years, was finally elevated to the status of a national programme last August. Pre-dating the Junior Cert, it has been through a variety of incarnations in its pilot phase from the Early School Leavers Programme to the Junior Cycle Programme to its present title.

The Elementary Programme - teachers say that the name is a misnomer - is an intervention to help students complete the Junior Cert. It is not an alternative programme as the name might suggest. Aimed at potential early school leavers, who may be demotivated rather than learning disabled, it uses a combination of a cross-curricular approach, innovative teaching methods, basic skills development and social and personal development, to help students sit the traditional Junior Cert.

It promotes teaching methods which arc experiential so that the balance of activity shifts away from the teacher towards the pupil. Teaching is also more inter-active, purposeful and relevant so that students can relate the programme to their lives.

A support service has been set up at the Department of Education's curriculum development unit in Dublin. The programme co-ordinator, Ms Aideen Cassidy, says that these students need something to encourage them and to make school relevant for them. "We give them a certificate to go along with the Junior Cert and this contains a list of their achievements," she explains.

As well as this profile of successes, students also get a certificate of participation and a school-based reference. In the past, students used the profile to get a job," says Ms Cassidy. "Now, more and more students are staying in school and they find it useful to get a summer job."

Some 45 schools are now taking part in the programme and 15 more will join soon. Eventually the programme will be extended to 80 schools. Each school, which must meet a list of criteria, is given an extra allocation of 0.25 of a teacher and £50 per student. Each school has a programme co-ordinator who gets an allowance of two hours per week to co-ordinate the programme.

Most of this year's 68,900 Junior Cert candidates will have come to it by way of traditional teaching methods. The diversity of candidates is recognised by the fact that the three staples of the Junior Cert - Irish, English and maths may be taken at foundation level, ordinary level or higher level. All other subjects are offered at ordinary and higher level only.

The two teachers unions representing second-level teachers, the Association Secondary Teachers Ireland and the Teachers Union of Ireland, are united in their support for foundation-level papers. Mr John White, assistant general secretary of the ASTI, says that he "would stress the fact that schools in general would try to ensure that pupils reach the highest standard but, for a small proportion of students, that is the foundation level."

At Leaving Cert, there are only an alternative level maths paper and foundation-level Irish. This leaves students who do foundation-level English at Junior Cert in a dilemma. There is some resistance to having foundation-level English at Leaving Cert level as there is an argument that students who can't cope with ordinary-level English would not be able to cope with any of the other subjects.

Ms Rose Malone, the TUI's education and research officer, says that the Leaving Cert Applied was promoted to them as the answer. But, it does not answer the problem of a student who wants to go to directly from the Leaving Cert to college (there is no direct access to third-level from the LCA).