2007 Junior Cert Exam timetable

Victor

Is there a 2007 timetable yet?

Davidius

Victor wrote:

Is there a 2007 timetable yet?

Decided to go ahead and ask. Says it should be available sometime in January. On a side note, the exams run from June 6th-21st for those who didn't know.

spurious

In general the exams follow the same order (subject-wise) as previous years.

oRlyYaRly

Because I'm so nice, and very bored, this is pretty much what the 2007 timetable will look like. Check out the attention to detail with regards Science!

Davidius

http://www.examinations.ie/exam/JC_LC_Timetables_2007.pdf

It's up...I think.

Piste

Yup that's it

Victor

We* demand a new sticky!!!

* Well not "we", but you know what I mean.

Piste

The title of this thread will be edited and you'll be happy with it!


well not "you" but you know what I mean


EDIT: Made into a new sticky for the sake of easy navigation and I like playing with the Mod tools.

oRlyYaRly

People were complaining about not being able to open the PDF the last time sooo:



I was soo close, but I forgot about the leap year, and to change the date to 30 March. :rolleyes:

And I thought only the new Science syllabus was running this year.

Davidius

I'm in everyday until the 14th and then it's all over for me. Looks like any day of pure study will have to be left for the weekend.

If only the second Irish paper and the second Maths paper were switched. I could really use that weekend for the Irish.

JSK 252

I thought the old 1989 (and clearly superior syllabus hahahahahahahha lol) science syllabus was finished last year and that the new sylabus was the only exam being examined this year.

I also thought that mary hannifin had finalised that the irish and english paper 1 would be sat on a saturday in may to relieve pressure from students, especially leaving certs.
I hope when I do the leaving cert in 2009 that this arrangement will be finalised because at the moment the exam timetable is like a muppet show.

PurpleFistMixer

Exams on a saturday? What madness is this?

spurious

Exams on a saturday? What madness is this?

Very expensive madness, but nice for a soundbite, which Mary is very good at.

Over-time payments for school porters to open on a Saturday.
Extra lighting and heating costs.
Over-time rates for invigilators.
Extra expenses to get to post offices that open late on a Saturday (not all do).
That's just for starters.

Lunacy.

PurpleFistMixer

And expecting people to give up their hard earned weekends in order to do exams! It's just wrong. Not only do we have to do exams, but not to be missing any school at the same time is just salt in the wound.
Well, at least I'm safe enough. No way they could bring that in before 2008.

JSK 252

PurpleFistMixer wrote:

And expecting people to give up their hard earned weekends in order to do exams! It's just wrong. Not only do we have to do exams, but not to be missing any school at the same time is just salt in the wound.
Well, at least I'm safe enough. No way they could bring that in before 2008.

So are you telling me that you would rather do an English paper 1 and 2 on the same day which equals 6 hours and 10 minutes. Thats totally crazy like. Its very hard for a human being to engage in that amount of writing not to mind English which is a total writathon. You will have the paper 1 in english and irish out of the way so you can concentrate on the paper 2 of both subjects. It will give the teachers a break aswell because after the exam they can concentrate on paper 2 in more depth. You say that the weekend is the wrong time to do it? So what! Its worth it at the end of the day. Your either going to do the exam in may or june. Whats the difference? Less pressure on students who are already under pressure with their other subjects. Dont you think that giving the student the best potential to excel in the exam is of paramount importance? It will also give more flexibility for other exams to be held on different days.

JSK 252

spurious wrote:

Exams on a saturday? What madness is this?

Very expensive madness, but nice for a soundbite, which Mary is very good at.

Over-time payments for school porters to open on a Saturday.
Extra lighting and heating costs.
Over-time rates for invigilators.
Extra expenses to get to post offices that open late on a Saturday (not all do).
That's just for starters.

Lunacy.

Spurious, to be quite honest I do think the government can forkout the money for the things you mention. Sure they put in 30 million into the electronic voting crap. Ok you are right about some of the logistic difficulties that will occur. That will need to be planned carefully. Im just wondering? Over time rates for invigilators? Sure if the exam is held in may or june they are still getting paid the same amount? Same amount of days? Am I right or am I wrong. I could be, you tell me. If it was over time the teachers would be delighted. Extra cash for the holidays. It would make the exam easier for students. Dont make a good possibility an impossibility. You have no foot to stand on and you are going to dig your self into a depper hole. Everything you have listed doesnt make sense. Post office expenses. So what!!!! Thats what the government is for! Are you seriously worried that the government will have to spend money if extra costs are involved?

I have more to say but I will say it some other time.

spurious

The SEC can't recruit enough teachers to invigilate and correct as it is. From the teacher point of view it's not the money - no-one wants to do it. This is why there are non-teachers correcting exams.

Are you aware of what happens when exams are running in a school, the already ridiculously high expenses involved?

The exam system badly needs reform, sure, but a hotch potch of bringing people in on Saturdays is not going to be the way to do it.

The NCCA have the Junior Cert review under way - any changes will come from there, not the DES, and will come for educational reasons not financial ones.

The government having enough money is neither here nor there - we have enough money in this country to have the world's best health service and look what we have.

PurpleFistMixer

JSK 252 wrote:

So are you telling me that you would rather do an English paper 1 and 2 on the same day which equals 6 hours and 10 minutes.

I don't think it's so bad, tbh. Like, your hand will kill you, but having paper 1 before paper 2 puts you in the right english mood, gets you writing, gets you relaxed. I'd say the same for Irish, but I think those papers aren't on the same days anyway.
I think they have it, for English anyway, done specifically like that. I mean, paper 1 doesn't really require studying (okay, basic stuff like letter formats etc., but nothing near what paper 2 requires), so it would seem it's put there on purpose before paper 2 as preparation. Changing the day it's on wont really change the study load of the day paper 2 is on, and it might even open the day up to having some other exam then, which would just be horrible.

I mean, having part of the exams done before june is great, I think, like art and music you get a nice chunk of it out of the way, but having it on a weekend is a little much. I mean, it's the leaving cert, you'd think they could afford to give a day off school for it.
Anyway, personally, I'd hate to have English and Irish on the same day. I find it hard enough to write Irish essays without complicating it by structuring them the way I'd do in English, so having the two on the same day would be a great disadvantage to me.

However, as I said, it's not coming in before I do my LC, so I needn't worry!

JSK 252

So if both of you think the idea is wrong, what do you propose instead? (without changing the exam fully, just the days its sat).

A lot of my teachers in my school said it would be a good idea but sure hey we all have an opinion and im not trying to fight with ye or anything, im just saying that my point is very valid even if you think its not

spurious

One thing they could do with the Junior Cert. is accept that it is no longer (for most people) a final exam. There are of course a minority for whom it is the terminal exam and a further minority for whom it is still a very hard hurdle to overcome, but the vast majority do not have any great difficulties with it.

Once this is taken as given, then they can make connections between the JC and the Leaving. As it is, the JC is set up (in marking schemes and questions) for the maximum number of people to pass. This is why in some subjects 70% of the candidates take Higher Level. Within a 70% cohort though, there is huge variation and yet the papers continue to make it easy for a literate motivated candidate to do very very well. This leads to the 'I got an A in me Junior' mantra that teachers all over the country have to deal with as one end of the 'A in me Junior' brigade start to struggle during 5th year with the different type of information management needed in the Leaving.

For example - there is no technical reason why an English/Maths/Irish exam at Junior Cert. has to be two papers. With a little imagination, a single paper could be set (with appropriate options) and students could choose areas that they had an interest in.

Unfortunately, the education system in Ireland is very exam-driven and if (say) a certain short story wasn't appearing on the paper then it would probably not be being covered in classes across the country.

Take the amount of information in Geography or History at Junior Cert.. There are many syllabus areas where all that is done at Leaving Cert. is the assimilation of extra information on a topic - there isn't a lot of 'new' learning. There is no reason why (for example) a great deal of physical geography could not be ONLY taught at Leaving Cert. and leave JC Geog time for developing cross-curricular skills that would be more useful later in life (college etc.).

I'm starting to ramble. I wouldn't like the JC to be done away with completely as it serves as a useful social milestone in Irish society and is still the 'Leaving Cert.' for some people, but we need a lot more imagination in how we approach examinations in this country. How to achieve that, better minds than mine have struggled with for years.

PurpleFistMixer

JSK 252 wrote:

So if both of you think the idea is wrong, what do you propose instead? (without changing the exam fully, just the days its sat).

I'm not saying your point isn't valid. I agree that having exams not-in-june releases pressure and all. Like, that's great. You can get 50% of music and 63% of art out of the way before June even begins. However, I think in this particular case, English paper 1 should stay with paper 2, and I think having it on a weekend is completely unnecessary.

I think with regards to changing it, perhaps the core three subjects shouldn't be so early on. I mean, English, Irish and Maths can be the most difficult subjects (or so I think), especially as you can't afford to be failing these, so having them grouped up with each other seems to put a lot of pressure on that particular week.
That said, it's also good as then they're out of the way, etc., and also because most people do them, so it gets the brunt of the exams out of the way. It's hard to say, though. I could say that I think Irish should be put in the second week and some other subject, say, a science, should be in the first, but then the people who struggle with science would find the first week bad, etc.
It's a little weird the way they split up maths, though.

Jayeire

eVeNtInE

This post has been deleted.