Heroic effort to finish in the time allowed

LEAVING CERTIFICATE/Economics: There was something almost heroic about Leaving Cert students who managed to pack the entire economics exam into 150 minutes - particularly as they were working without the benefit of injury time.

"Any student who completed that exam in the 2½ hours deserved to be honoured in the Phoenix Park," said Mr Dermot McCarthy, who teaches in the Abbey Vocational School in Donegal town.

"The higher-level paper had good balance, but there was a lot of work involved in some questions." Topics which would have constituted half a question five or six years ago had become smaller parts of very long questions," he said.

"It puts a real strain on them to complete the paper in the allotted time."

Section B question 1 part (b) was a lot of work for 20 marks, he said. Question 2 dipped into too many areas of the course. And, while question 3 was a "nice topic", it was overloaded and would have taken a lot of time, he said. "This style of question will not attract new students to the subject."

Students got a double dose of Keynesian economics, with the subject appearing in questions 4 in both Section A and Section B. "This was a bit careless. They could have found something else to ask students," Mr McCarthy said.

He was happy overall with the questions in Section A. Although the paper was long, it had been appropriately pitched to higher level.

"The race for points has driven some students to do honours when their capabilities suggest ordinary level is the limit of their potential. That's why sometimes you get a lot of complaints about economics that aren't justified," he said.

Mr Michael Corley said that his higher-level students in St Flannan's College, Ennis, were happy with the paper.

"I'd find it extremely difficult to criticise it," he said. However, he agreed that it had been a very time-consuming paper. "The paper reflects the course, which is very wide, and it also has to have a link to current events."

Students who did ordinary level were happy enough with the paper. However, Mr McCarthy said that there was a bit too much reading in questions 5 and 6, and part (c) of question 6 would have been testing even at higher level.

"To ask a pass student about deregulation of markets could cause mental paralysis," he said. "The honours and pass papers should be constructed by the same individual so that a sensible degree of difference is maintained at both levels."