'I expected a horror, but it was grand'

ST ANGELA'S COLLEGE:ENGLISH PAPER I was well received among students at St Angela's College on Patrick's Hill in Cork city yesterday.

Leaving Certificate students emerged blinking into the glorious sunshine to compare notes with friends and offered a positive response to the first paper of the 2009 State exams.

Sixty-eight students at St Angela’s sat the English paper, most opting for Higher level. Jennifer Barrett (17), from Blarney, said the paper was not as bad as expected. “It was a nice enough paper, most of it is your own thoughts and understanding, so that makes it easier. Paper II is more difficult so I’m going home to cram for that for the afternoon, though the hot weather does not make it easy,” she said.

Emma Horan (17), from Montenotte, finished the paper and left 20 minutes early.

“I was expecting a horrible paper, but this was actually grand. I finished early and read over everything and I’m happy enough about it,” she said.

Friends Aoife MacCarthy and Iseult Cooper-Stockdale both liked the paper, which they said was general enough to appeal to everyone. “It was a really nice paper; the essay topics were quite varied. I chose the science and technology essay option, but there was something for everyone there – it was a pretty general paper,” Aoife MacCarthy (18) said.

Few frayed nerves were evident, with students claiming they were more nervous in the build-up to the exams and were relieved to get started.

“They were very calm coming in this morning – there were no nerves. They have done the work now, they are well prepared,” principal Rosalie Maloney said.

Chloe Murphy (18), from Tower, took the Ordinary level paper. “I thought the essay titles were kind of hard, but the comprehension questions were easy enough – we had a question about YouTube, so that was easy enough to answer – it was fairly straightforward,” she said.

At Junior Cert level, some of the students were surprised by the layout of the paper.

Kate Ray (15), from Ballyhooley Road, was the first student to leave the exam hall. “I was expecting a report to come up, but it was a letter instead, and Question 1 was comprehension, so that was a bit unusual. There was a functional letter choice, which I thought was too hard, and then an option for personal writing. In media studies there was a discussion about the watershed, which I think some people may have found difficult,” she said.