Sec and education system

EoghanIRL

This year I thought the sec did a horrendous job. I found mistakes on multiple papers and listenings. We pay for the exams. They should be proof read better
Compared to other years I thought that some of the papers were misleading. I found maths to be very indecisive. The sec are relatively new and I don't think they have yet perfected their papers. People also seemed unhappy with LC maths. They are messing with and changing the papers at the expense of the students. They should gradually implement change not bombard it on us with new ideas and impractical subjects.For instance project maths. This subject was more than likely brought in to encourage people to do better at maths. With low percentages of people doing honours maths And high fail rates why not bring out a newer and easier maths which people can more than likely do good in.
It's blatantly obvious that this subject was not thought out very well and to introduce it to this years 5th years. As seen in this years jc and LC it doesn't matter if you didn't pick project maths because they tried to implement it into the normal maths exam, once again at the expense of the students.
I understand that there is no such thing as the perfect system but this one seems flawed. Our teacher spent a lot of time teaching us and telling us to learn the exam. A lot of people do this instead of focusing on learning the course and the sec want to change this. The state exams are vital to our future !
Also why is Irish a compulsory subject. From what I hear the majority of people hate it . It's an extra subject and no other country speaks it. Making a language such as Spanish or Chinese compulsory would be much more beneficial. A lot of jobs are being created in china at the moment. It's time to accept that the Irish language is dead. People don't want to speak it. So why make it compulsory. Let the people that want to learn it learn it. Don't make the rest of us do it. People fail exams because of Irish. There should be an investigation into how irish is taught starting in primary schools.Either equip teachers with a proper standard in the language and get them to teach it better or more or just drop it!

I don't see why the sec give us one big exam at the end of our course. Other countries have continues assessments. This would be much better. If we had continues assessments people would have to learn every bit to do well instead of only learning the bits you want for a big exam. Because of this people think well this hasn't came up in the last few years so I won't learn .
just because it never came up before doesn't mean it won't. And after ten years of predictable patterns it appears they have started new beginnings with different patterns emerging absolutely screwing the people that are told learn the exam.

The point system also fails. People have new security going into exams. People aim for 400 points just to find out the next Monday that it has risen by 40 points. How are students supposed to prepare for this.
Finally the correction and teachers. I found it shocking how low qualification standards were and a lot of teachers don't have propers degrees in the subjects they teach. That is not fair to the student and ruins the system. This is the most comprehensive study ever on maths teachers' qualifications in Ireland.
t
The main findings of the study include:

48pc of second-level school maths teachers don't have a proper qualification, and most of them have degrees in science or business studies.
Younger and weaker students are most often taught by teachers without a maths qualification.
A downward trend in the number of maths teachers with a proper qualification from 65pc among those aged over 35 to 40pc of those aged under 35.

This is shocking. These teachers who don't have proper qualifications could end up correcting papers. Teaching standards and qualifications need to increase. It's just appalling. In other countries you need a proper degree and qualification in your subject to teach it . It's just common sense.
A girl in my community got an b2 in Irish. She sent I back and got an a. How can you justify this crap marking.

The system is flawed in so many ways. I know we're all in the same boat here but it is unjust and unfair. It is our future that they are messing with. Also the government are to belane with the introduction of transition year. Waste of money and time. Most schools are under funded and resourced. And the country is being led by a school teacher. Our literacy levels are also schocking .
We are the future generation . It will be hard for us to find jobs leaving college.dont make it harder by ruining the education system any further.

Anyone else agree?

spurious

I don't know where to start with all the inaccuracies in this.

Just to address two blatant errors:
The SEC is not 'new' it is what used to be called 'Examinations Branch'. It's mostly the same personnel.

48% of Maths teachers not having a 'proper qualification'? This has been debunked many times. If you mean a pure Maths degree, then no, they don't, but you could count on one hand the number of pure Maths graduates who go into teaching, the job security and pay is so bad they don't bother. Most Maths teachers would have Maths as one of the subjects in their degree, or be coming at it from a Science/Engineering background. This is not the same as 'not having a proper qualification'.

tl, dr - if you want to rant at least be accurate in your facts.

Leinsterr

EoghanIRL wrote: »

This year I thought the sec did a horrendous job. I found mistakes on multiple papers and listenings. We pay for the exams. They should be proof read better
Compared to other years I thought that some of the papers were misleading. I found maths to be very indecisive. The sec are relatively new and I don't think they have yet perfected their papers. People also seemed unhappy with LC maths. They are messing with and changing the papers at the expense of the students. They should gradually implement change not bombard it on us with new ideas and impractical subjects.For instance project maths. This subject was more than likely brought in to encourage people to do better at maths. With low percentages of people doing honours maths And high fail rates why not bring out a newer and easier maths which people can more than likely do good in.
It's blatantly obvious that this subject was not thought out very well and to introduce it to this years 5th years. As seen in this years jc and LC it doesn't matter if you didn't pick project maths because they tried to implement it into the normal maths exam, once again at the expense of the students.
I understand that there is no such thing as the perfect system but this one seems flawed. Our teacher spent a lot of time teaching us and telling us to learn the exam. A lot of people do this instead of focusing on learning the course and the sec want to change this. The state exams are vital to our future !
Also why is Irish a compulsory subject. From what I hear the majority of people hate it . It's an extra subject and no other country speaks it. Making a language such as Spanish or Chinese compulsory would be much more beneficial. A lot of jobs are being created in china at the moment. It's time to accept that the Irish language is dead. People don't want to speak it. So why make it compulsory. Let the people that want to learn it learn it. Don't make the rest of us do it. People fail exams because of Irish. There should be an investigation into how irish is taught starting in primary schools.Either equip teachers with a proper standard in the language and get them to teach it better or more or just drop it!

I don't see why the sec give us one big exam at the end of our course. Other countries have continues assessments. This would be much better. If we had continues assessments people would have to learn every bit to do well instead of only learning the bits you want for a big exam. Because of this people think well this hasn't came up in the last few years so I won't learn .
just because it never came up before doesn't mean it won't. And after ten years of predictable patterns it appears they have started new beginnings with different patterns emerging absolutely screwing the people that are told learn the exam.

The point system also fails. People have new security going into exams. People aim for 400 points just to find out the next Monday that it has risen by 40 points. How are students supposed to prepare for this.
Finally the correction and teachers. I found it shocking how low qualification standards were and a lot of teachers don't have propers degrees in the subjects they teach. That is not fair to the student and ruins the system. This is the most comprehensive study ever on maths teachers' qualifications in Ireland.
t
The main findings of the study include:

48pc of second-level school maths teachers don't have a proper qualification, and most of them have degrees in science or business studies.
Younger and weaker students are most often taught by teachers without a maths qualification.
A downward trend in the number of maths teachers with a proper qualification from 65pc among those aged over 35 to 40pc of those aged under 35.

This is shocking. These teachers who don't have proper qualifications could end up correcting papers. Teaching standards and qualifications need to increase. It's just appalling. In other countries you need a proper degree and qualification in your subject to teach it . It's just common sense.
A girl in my community got an b2 in Irish. She sent I back and got an a. How can you justify this crap marking.

The system is flawed in so many ways. I know we're all in the same boat here but it is unjust and unfair. It is our future that they are messing with. Also the government are to belane with the introduction of transition year. Waste of money and time. Most schools are under funded and resourced. And the country is being led by a school teacher. Our literacy levels are also schocking .
We are the future generation . It will be hard for us to find jobs leaving college.dont make it harder by ruining the education system any further.

Anyone else agree?

I agree with basically everything you said. There are some serious faults in the system but as you said there is no perfect system. As nerdish as this sounds, even for the JC, an incentive should be put in place to encourage more people to do well instead of coasting along. For example, if a student doesnt pass over 5 subjects, he/she has to repeat those exams in summer school or something like that. Its not perfect as teachers dont want to do it but at least students will be motivated.
What really p*sses me off is the way we are taught in school. In Irish, for example, we arent taught how to speak the language, we are just told to translate stuff and learn grammar as it allows us to do better in the exam, yet we are going to forget irish 2 years after we leave secondary due to this teaching so its just pointless. I agree that Irish should not be a compulsory subject. Just think about it. If I want to work in France, I have to learn French if I want a job. If a French person wants to work in Ireland, they have to learn English. WHERE DOES IRISH COME INTO THIS. I'm very lucky I have a natural aptitude for languages (I think due to music) so it doesnt bother me at all, but i feel that students time is being wasted if they arent being taught properly and they dont really care about Irish.
At least the new JC system for 2014 wont be too bad. There are only 3 core subjects and the maximum amount of subjects you can do for JC is 8. Thats a real kick in the face for the students who are starting the JC in 2013. The government should have realised ages ago that students are put under too much pressure in school and half the subjects are a waste of time. I'm not saying its solving our education problem but its a start.
The problem with Maths teachers is out of control, I feel. From 1st to 3rd year I have had probably the worst teacher in my school. She isnt allowed to teach leaving cert as she doesnt have a degree in anything but yet she is allowed to screw us over where foundations are put in place?? Mid-way through 2nd year we were split into honours1, honours2 and pass for Maths. There were 2 honours1 classes (now 1 since loads dropped to pass) and the two worst teachers had to teach them. Unfortunately i got the worse of 2 evils. The system is a joke.
Sorry for ranting but I get so annoyed whenever someone brings up the faults in our education system.:mad:

Bazinga_N

This year I thought the sec did a horrendous job. I found mistakes on multiple papers and listenings. We pay for the exams. They should be proof read better Compared to other years I thought that some of the papers were misleading. I found maths to be very indecisive. The sec are relatively new and I don't think they have yet perfected their papers.

I think you may be slightly exaggerating here. Any textbook you come across has numerous errors, that's just how it is. To be honest, this is a bit of a 'get over it' issue.

People also seemed unhappy with LC maths. They are messing with and changing the papers at the expense of the students. They should gradually implement change not bombard it on us with new ideas and impractical subjects.For instance project maths. This subject was more than likely brought in to encourage people to do better at maths. With low percentages of people doing honours maths And high fail rates why not bring out a newer and easier maths which people can more than likely do good in. It's blatantly obvious that this subject was not thought out very well and to introduce it to this years 5th years. As seen in this years jc and LC it doesn't matter if you didn't pick project maths because they tried to implement it into the normal maths exam, once again at the expense of the students.

When is anyone happy with maths? :L In my opinion, only some people have an interest in maths, but everyone should have an understanding in it. Look at what I out in bold above. We don't make an easier maths because than not one Irish student would have a chance at getting a good job anywhere outside Ireland nevermind getting into a University over there. In my opinion, we should have a system where people have to study basic courses in all the key areas of mathematics and the students could have the optional of furthering a study into those topics (e.g. You'd have to take Basic Algebra, whereas Intermediate and Advanced Algebra would be optional.). What you're attempting to say about the bringing out of Project Maths, slightly puzzles me. I'm not exactly sure if you're trying to say Project Maths is a different subject from Maths or what?

I understand that there is no such thing as the perfect system but this one seems flawed. Our teacher spent a lot of time teaching us and telling us to learn the exam. A lot of people do this instead of focusing on learning the course and the sec want to change this. The state exams are vital to our future !

Agree completely with what you're saying here. Currently we're only being taught how to take an exam. But, what can you do? It's not our teacher's faults! It's the Dept of Education's and tbh a little bit of society. It's thought that unless you get straight A's in all your exams you're not a genius, even though Albert Einstein failed his maths exam! :rolleyes:

Also why is Irish a compulsory subject.

:rolleyes: Because it's our heritage, once again a 'get over it' moment. If you want to be Chinese or Spanish, go study in China or Spain But while, you're here you will study Irish whether you like it or not.

From what I hear the majority of people hate it . It's an extra subject and no other country speaks it.

Oh lord :rolleyes: No other country speaks it, because it's our language! Welsh people study Welsh (Welsh or Welch? I'm confused :L) , the Irish study Irish. And tbh if the English weren't so power driven neanderthals, we'd still be speaking Irish on a daily basis. So blame them, not the Dept of Education!

Making a language such as Spanish or Chinese compulsory would be much more beneficial. A lot of jobs are being created in china at the moment.

We're not Spanish or Chinese. Deal with it. WE'RE IRISH HENCE WE STUDY IRISH!! :O Christ! :rolleyes: Spanish is an optional language as it's such a popular one, however not as many schools do it as French or German, Italian is the same. I was under the impression that there was many talks about Chinese becoming a subject? I know my school started Mandarin classes this year after school:)

It's time to accept that the Irish language is dead. People don't want to speak it. So why make it compulsory. Let the people that want to learn it learn it. Don't make the rest of us do it. People fail exams because of Irish. There should be an investigation into how irish is taught starting in primary schools.Either equip teachers with a proper standard in the language and get them to teach it better or more or just drop it!

The Irish Language is not dead. -.- It won't die until not one person speaks it, and I'm pretty sure every school and Gaeltacht would like to disagree with you. Who ever failed an entire JC or LC because of one subject? I agree with you however, on how badly Irish is taught.

I don't see why the sec give us one big exam at the end of our course. Other countries have continues assessments. This would be much better. If we had continues assessments people would have to learn every bit to do well instead of only learning the bits you want for a big exam. Because of this people think well this hasn't came up in the last few years so I won't learn .
just because it never came up before doesn't mean it won't. And after ten years of predictable patterns it appears they have started new beginnings with different patterns emerging absolutely screwing the people that are told learn the exam.

The whole point is, you're meant to learn EVERYTHING! And then, instead of quizzing you on everything the exam picks out some bits at random to see if you learned it!! :rolleyes: Did you know Libya takes the Leaving Certificate? Because not all countries agree with the continuous assessment, but unfortunately Ireland's caved in and now our future kids have to do the continuous assessment so quit complaining!

The point system also fails. People have new security going into exams. People aim for 400 points just to find out the next Monday that it has risen by 40 points. How are students supposed to prepare for this.

Can't even comment on how you don't understand how this works -.-

Finally the correction and teachers. I found it shocking how low qualification standards were and a lot of teachers don't have propers degrees in the subjects they teach. That is not fair to the student and ruins the system. This is the most comprehensive study ever on maths teachers' qualifications in Ireland. The main findings of the study include: 48pc of second-level school maths teachers don't have a proper qualification, and most of them have degrees in science or business studies. Younger and weaker students are most often taught by teachers without a maths qualification. A downward trend in the number of maths teachers with a proper qualification from 65pc among those aged over 35 to 40pc of those aged under 35.

Refer to spurious's post on how stupid this sounds.

This is shocking. These teachers who don't have proper qualifications could end up correcting papers. Teaching standards and qualifications need to increase. It's just appalling. In other countries you need a proper degree and qualification in your subject to teach it . It's just common sense.
A girl in my community got an b2 in Irish. She sent I back and got an a. How can you justify this crap marking.

You go correct a couple of hundred practically identical exam papers and try to make no mistakes. :rolleyes:

The system is flawed in so many ways. I know we're all in the same boat here but it is unjust and unfair. It is our future that they are messing with. Also the government are to belane with the introduction of transition year. Waste of money and time. Most schools are under funded and resourced. And the country is being led by a school teacher. Our literacy levels are also schocking

.

It's up to the student's to get off there asses and do some work in TY. My school has one of the best TY programmes in the country. I attend a VEC school. So we're nothing better than any other school out there yet, we won YSI outright, and various other projects this year. How? Because we have students and teachers that actually make an effort and use all the resources available to them. I'm going into TY next year (Sept 2013), and they have changed the program for that year. Instead of sending us to pointless Geography or Maths classes that we don't actually learn anything in, our school's allowing us to study our LC subjects during that time and spend the rest on our extra-curricular activities. Also, since you're so big on China my school (the student, mind you) connected with a school in China this year via internet. And went to Shanghi to visit them. We'll be doing the same in two years time Because we're not lazy asses that sit around complaining we have f**k all to do

We are the future generation . It will be hard for us to find jobs leaving college.dont make it harder by ruining the education system any further. Any one agree?

I for one don't.


Note:- I probably have a million spelling mistakes in this post, but I was typing fairly fast and a tad bit lazily (it's sunday! LEAVE ME ALONE!! :L)

Oozamine

Bazinga_N wrote: »

I think you may be slightly exaggerating here. Any textbook you come across has numerous errors, that's just how it is. To be honest, this is a bit of a 'get over it' issue.

I seldom see a misprint or mistake in on of my textbooks. Teachers pick what textbooks the student has,therefore they should be picking the right one. By the sounds of it your teachers are too lazy to do their research on the best book out there for the course,or they wrote the book and trying to capitalize by making their students pay €20/€30 for it.

When is anyone happy with maths? :L In my opinion, only some people have an interest in maths, but everyone should have an understanding in it. Look at what I out in bold above. We don't make an easier maths because than not one Irish student would have a chance at getting a good job anywhere outside Ireland nevermind getting into a University over there. In my opinion, we should have a system where people have to study basic courses in all the key areas of mathematics and the students could have the optional of furthering a study into those topics (e.g. You'd have to take Basic Algebra, whereas Intermediate and Advanced Algebra would be optional.). What you're attempting to say about the bringing out of Project Maths, slightly puzzles me. I'm not exactly sure if you're trying to say Project Maths is a different subject from Maths or what?

I can't see the logic behind that statement.


Agree completely with what you're saying here. Currently we're only being taught how to take an exam. But, what can you do? It's not our teacher's faults! It's the Dept of Education's and tbh a little bit of society. It's thought that unless you get straight A's in all your exams you're not a genius, even though Albert Einstein failed his maths exam! :rolleyes:

I agree,especially in Irish,as rote learning plays a big part,not understanding what it means but still writing it down because it was in a text book.

:rolleyes: Because it's our heritage, once again a 'get over it' moment. If you want to be Chinese or Spanish, go study in China or Spain But while, you're here you will study Irish whether you like it or not.

I find that as quite an invalid argument along with your 'get over it' statements in your post. I dont see why Irish is compulsory. In school its about making a future for yourself, and for nearly almost everybody, Irish doesnt and will not play a part outside school.



Oh lord :rolleyes: No other country speaks it, because it's our language! Welsh people study Welsh (Welsh or Welch? I'm confused :L) , the Irish study Irish. And tbh if the English weren't so power driven neanderthals, we'd still be speaking Irish on a daily basis. So blame them, not the Dept of Education!

Find that very hard to believe,considering how much Ireland has industrialised itself. Its not that i dont like the language,as i hope to get an A in it when my results come out and i worked hard for it,but i just find it hard to believe.


The Irish Language is not dead. -.- It won't die until not one person speaks it, and I'm pretty sure every school and Gaeltacht would like to disagree with you. Who ever failed an entire JC or LC because of one subject? I agree with you however, on how badly Irish is taught.

Ofcourse they would disagree,and they would like to say its stronger then ever,but for many of those people speaking Irish is their job,and its how they make a living,so yes they would say that.

The whole point is, you're meant to learn EVERYTHING! And then, instead of quizzing you on everything the exam picks out some bits at random to see if you learned it!! :rolleyes: Did you know Libya takes the Leaving Certificate? Because not all countries agree with the continuous assessment, but unfortunately Ireland's caved in and now our future kids have to do the continuous assessment so quit complaining!

how is the OP complaining,hes giving his views,most of which i agree with.
.



You go correct a couple of hundred practically identical exam papers and try to make no mistakes. :rolleyes:

Quite an invalid argument. These 'experienced' examiners are paid to do their job,which some are doing wrongly by giving out wrong grades,at the expence of the students future,through college placements and CAO points. The students also pay for the exams to be corrected,so why should they be subject to silly mistakes such as calculation errors and other stupid mistakes?