Comment in to-day's exam diary ...

randylonghorn

Happened to notice this in to-day's Exam Diary by Laura Gaynor in the Indo:

"Last year, for instance, Sylvia Plath's absence on the exam bereaved thousands of students who left their exam with heartbroken faces. This year things have changed. Plath came up! The State Examinations Commission has finally given their paying customers what they want."

Discuss!

Seriously, anyone have any thoughts or views on the comment in bold?

teach88

I don't think it has any basis in fact. It was Plath's turn.

Certain exams are more predictable than others but I can't see this as anything more than an off-the-cuff comment.

kingcobra

Well she was going to come up sometime anyway, just like any other poet, it's not as if they can keep her off the exam paper forever and act like they're not giving in to their "paying customers."

randylonghorn

Plath's appearance, or whether this was a sop to student expectations, wasn't really what I was getting at!

Are students the SEC's "paying customers"?

Does the SEC have responsibility to anyone else?

Is giving students "what they want to see on the exam" an appropriate way to fulfil the SEC's responsibility to students, for that matter?

aimzLc2

randylonghorn wrote: »

Plath's appearance, or whether this was a sop to student expectations, wasn't really what I was getting at!

Are students the SEC's "paying customers"?

Does the SEC have responsibility to anyone else?

Is giving students "what they want to see on the exam" an appropriate way to fulfil the SEC's responsibility to students, for that matter?

The SEC can do whatever they like! some students act like the SEC owes them something but they are trying to test us not give us what we want.

spurious

Not everyone sitting the exams pays the SEC, so it doesn't even make sense.

Bad journalism/writing, I'd say (shock - in the Indo??:D).

randylonghorn

spurious wrote: »

Bad journalism/writing, I'd say (shock - in the Indo??:D).

Ah, in fairness, it's the student Exam Diary!

I'm more interested in how many students feel like Laura does, and maybe unpicking / critiquing the rationale for that a bit, as my experience in third level would suggest that this kind of attitude is becoming more and more common.

Jackobyte

randylonghorn wrote: »

Happened to notice this in to-day's Exam Diary by Laura Gaynor in the Indo:

"Last year, for instance, Sylvia Plath's absence on the exam bereaved thousands of students who left their exam with heartbroken faces. This year things have changed. Plath came up! The State Examinations Commission has finally given their paying customers what they want."

Discuss!

Seriously, anyone have any thoughts or views on the comment in bold?

The "paying customer" part sounds odd. It's not as if we aren't going to pay to sit the leaving cert if they continue to catch us out with odd exams. If anything, it'd increase the value of the exams to become a better representation of the student as the person learning one poet like many did with Plath won't get the grades. I'd say it was more a case that after the disaster that was last year, they weren't going to throw any curve-balls this year.

woopah92

What we wanted? Personally, I wanted Shakespeare to come up.

Peregrine

spurious wrote: »

the Indo??

There's your answer randy

It's an article a diary written by a student, believe me when I say this, even most of the 'good' students are actually very poorly informed in things outside the Leaving Cert. I'd say comments like that are thrown around schools all the time too. Very similar to "What's the point in doing homework?".

We are in no way SEC's 'paying customers'. We're paying the SEC to assess our abilities in whichever subjects. They have no obligation at all to provide us with questions we like, that would totally destroy the purpose of a test anyway.

It' the same as people taking the theory test or the driving test, the RSA have no obligation to make the test easy for them. People pay to be assessed and if satisfied, to certify them, RSA's obligation is to make sure other people'd lives are safe on the road.

The word 'customer' implies a purchase of goods or services. But we're paying a fee for the service rather than 'purchasing' the service. A fee in this case will be defined as "a sum charged by an institution for a privilege".

TL;DR: Stupid Indo, uninformed student

0mega

Well they certainly didn't give us the Macbeth questions we would've wanted. I reckon they made other sections slightly easier to compensate for that.

NellyDean

Not sure if this is relevant but the SEC should continue being "kinder" to students I think. Not just the Plath thing, (even though it worked out well for me personally, I understand it wasn't the case for everyone) But the higher math was apparently grand too!


What's the point in making exams horrible for students if we're all pitted against each other anyway? They should word the questions nicely and stick to topics as hoped, that way students don't feel in hell during exams and the grades won't change cos they're being marked against each other anyway.


What do yous think? There's probably a flaw in my argument.. feel free to point it out :P

woopah92

0mega wrote: »

Well they certainly didn't give us the Macbeth questions we would've wanted. I reckon they made other sections slightly easier to compensate for that.

There's more than one single text, just because one set of questions was difficult I doubt they'd make the rest of the paper easier as a result.

Vito Corleone

Does anyone actually know a school that studies anything other than Macbeth (Shakespearian text)?

woopah92

Vito Corleone wrote: »

Does anyone actually know a school that studies anything other than Macbeth (Shakespearian text)?

I did Antigone. The girls school down the road from mine did The Great Gatsby.
You'd be surprised, I know of quite a few who did different single texts.

hfallada

A majority of people expected Wordsworth or Shakespeare as they aren't on the course next year. Saying that everyone assumed Plath would have been on the exam is just ridculous and indicating the english exam was predictable which it wasn't. As a newspaper article never came up.

Personally I think the way the paper was this year, that an excellent students couldn't show this as it was a weird choice of questions

randylonghorn

Nimrod 7 wrote: »

We are in no way SEC's 'paying customers'. We're paying the SEC to assess our abilities in whichever subjects. They have no obligation at all to provide us with questions we like, that would totally destroy the purpose of a test anyway.

Spot on.

Nimrod 7 wrote: »

It's the same as people taking the theory test or the driving test, the RSA have no obligation to make the test easy for them. People pay to be assessed and if satisfied, to certify them, RSA's obligation is to make sure other people'd lives are safe on the road.

That's a good parallel, actually.

From my point of view, the SEC are funded by (mostly, what students pay in exam fees is a drop in the ocean!) and have a responsibility to society and the state as a whole. They have a responsibility to society, to the state, to the colleges who will accept students on the basis of their results, to the students and to their families to assess them fairly and realistically on the basis of the curriculum they are supposed to have studied (not just this year's Jackson or IoE predictions!). They shouldn't be seeking to be cruel or unusual in their setting of papers, but neither should they be pandering to the "isn't it terridble, Joe, they actually expect de poor kids to learn something!" brigade.

The "paying customer" bit though is to me symptomatic of a malaise that has infected society in Ireland and elsewhere in the last couple of decades, and especially since the days of the Diseased Celtic Kitten. I'm not having a go at Laura, btw, I think she's reflecting an attitude which many people her age (and indeed older!) have these days.

It's called "commodification", it's an aspect of consumerism ... everything has a price and everyone knows the price of everything but the value of nothing! And if they're paying their fees (or even if the state is paying it on their behalf) they're "entitled", they're the "customer" and should get top points in the LC / top marks in their degree!

And in a way, they are entitled, just not to what they think they are these days ... they're entitled to decent teaching, to decent facilities, to a good library and access to labs etc. (and I know these things aren't always as good as we would like especially in the current economic climate, but that's a different if related argument) ... and they're "entitled" to put their heads down, do their work and learn something! (And sure, have a decent social life along the way by all means!)

But seriously ... I've had students tell me it was unfair that they failed modules because "they paid their fees"!

Sure, why go to college at all? Here's an easier system, just pay up the fees and we'll give you an honours degree, like you would pay for your sliced pan in Dunnes!!

The colleges will make a profit instead of being always in the red, and students get their degrees!

Everyone wins!

Or do they??

NellyDean wrote: »

They should word the questions nicely and stick to topics as hoped, that way students don't feel in hell during exams and the grades won't change cos they're being marked against each other anyway.

What do yous think? There's probably a flaw in my argument.. feel free to point it out :P

I wouldn't be a proponent of cruel or unusual exam papers, or students who have worked hard feeling in hell during exams by any means, Nelly, but there are a few problems with "sticking to topics as hoped" and being nice and predictable.

What incentive is there for students to cover the whole curriculum if they can rely on cast-in-stone predictions?

Why cover 8 poets if you *know* Plath is coming up? As it is, the set-up allows students / teachers to narrow / focus the course reasonably ... do 5 poets and you are *absolutely guaranteed* one will come up, probably more ... and the SEC know that just as you and I do, that's built in.

But if all papers are completely predictable, what happens is that most students cover 20-30% of the course they're supposed to be covering, and sin é!

It also gives (even more of) an advantage to richer students who can afford the IoE or other grind schools where predictions have become a science!

Vito Corleone wrote: »

I took the "paying customer" as an off the cuff comment.

Oh, I agree, Vito, as I said it wasn't my intent to have a go at Laura at all (hopefully, if she's reading, she will understand this!).

I simply picked up on it as a perfect example of an attitude I see every day in modern Irish society ... "we're paying, we're entitled! Responsibilities? ... what are those?!":pac:

Peregrine

randylonghorn wrote: »

...

Everything you just said..is just..true, it's all true People don't see the consequences of most things they wish for, if the SEC just published questions that are 'predicted', you might as well just scrap the whole exam system.

Just to add to this:

randylonghorn wrote: »

The "paying customer" bit though is to me symptomatic of a malaise that has infected society in Ireland and elsewhere in the last couple of decades, and especially since the days of the Diseased Celtic Kitten. I'm not having a go at Laura, btw, I think she's reflecting an attitude which many people her age (and indeed older!) have these days.

It's called "commodification", it's an aspect of consumerism ... everything has a price and everyone knows the price of everything but the value of nothing! And if they're paying their fees (or even if the state is paying it on their behalf) they're "entitled", they're the "customer" and should get top points in the LC / top marks in their degree!

People have forgotten the difference between purchasing a commodity and paying a fee for a privilege. When you pay a fee for a privilege(that is also subsidised), you are NOT a customer and you are not entitled to anything other than fair, unbiased treatment. Demanding easier questions is, like you said commodifying the exam system. If it answers to money, it is completely useless as an examination system.

Kind of similar situation: Have you ever seen people arguing that they don't like certain RTÉ content and question why it is being shown when they are paying license fee? Somehow people have managed to get it into their heads that they alone are a direct customer of RTÉ and all their programmes should be aimed at them.
Their duty is to provide a universal service to the whole country, not to provide one person with their favourite shows. It's a situation where people are seeing themselves as single customers of a system rather than one of millions of fee paying users.

HugsiePie

randylonghorn wrote: »

Happened to notice this in to-day's Exam Diary by Laura Gaynor in the Indo:

"Last year, for instance, Sylvia Plath's absence on the exam bereaved thousands of students who left their exam with heartbroken faces. This year things have changed. Plath came up! The State Examinations Commission has finally given their paying customers what they want."

Discuss!

Seriously, anyone have any thoughts or views on the comment in bold?

Ah don't be hating on Laura, she meant it as a joke (and she goes to my school, she's lovely, she does occasionally come out with lines like that, she doesn't actually mean anything by it) she does tend to say some weird things here and there (sorry), this being a prime example, its just her sense of humour. I think yee are looking into it far too much.

randylonghorn

HugsiePie wrote: »

Ah don't be hating on Laura, she meant it as a joke (and she goes to my school, she's lovely, she does occasionally come out with lines like that, she doesn't actually mean anything by it) she does tend to say some weird things here and there (sorry), this being a prime example, its just her sense of humour. I think yee are looking into it far too much.

Did you read the whole thread, Hugsie?

randylonghorn wrote: »

Oh, I agree, Vito, as I said it wasn't my intent to have a go at Laura at all (hopefully, if she's reading, she will understand this!).

I simply picked up on it as a perfect example of an attitude I see every day in modern Irish society ... "we're paying, we're entitled! Responsibilities? ... what are those?!":pac: