Leaving Cert maths: Student ‘dismay’ over higher level paper

Students and teachers have expressed dismay after the Leaving Cert higher level maths paper failed to feature a widely-anticipated question on financial maths, which teachers will have spent up to six weeks covering in class.

Luke Saunders, founder of StudyClix.ie and a teacher at Jesus and Mary Secondary School in Enniscrone, Co Sligo, said the lack of a question on the higher level paper will dismay teachers who have been preaching the relevance of maths to their student's everyday lives and who spent significant amounts of time on continuous professional development.

“Teachers will have spent up to six weeks covering mortgages, wages, pensions, tax, interest and debt and yet not a single euro sign appeared on today’s higher paper.

“I often think it must be difficult for students to understand the everyday relevance of questions such as today’s question seven, which looked at the rate of change of the volume of a ball being inflated.”

Mr Saunders pointed out that the Project Maths team hosted voluntary professional development courses, run over four evenings, to bring teachers up to speed on the teaching of financial maths.

Aidan Roantree, a maths teacher at the Institute of Education, also expressed surprise.

“Despite so many predictions to the contrary, financial maths was conspicuous by its absence. Financial maths is a major topic on the new syllabus, and its omission is unexpected.

“Its absence will have disappointed many students, who would have invested a lot of time and energy on it.”

Mr Saunders added, however, that well-prepared higher-level students would have been put at ease by the appearance of De Moivres theorem, modulus inequalities, logs and proof by induction.

“It was clear to me that the examiners are keen to reinforce the idea that students and teachers must cover the entire course.”

Mr Saunders said that the ordinary level paper will be “welcomed for its return to the use of familiar notation after last year’s obscure paper.”

Sarah Saunders, one of the Irish Times leaving cert diarists, said that she and her classmates all thought that ordinary level paper was simple and straightforward and that they were all happy with it.

This was echoed on Twitter, where the ordinary level paper was variously described as “godly”, “piss easy”, “a beauty” and “the most beautiful thing ever.”

One student said simply: “Ordinary Level Maths Hahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahahahahaha hahahahaha hahahahahahahahahahah ahahahahahaha hahahahahahaha.”