Six subjects or seven?

The Gopher

Is it 6 or 7 exam subjects you do in LC???The teacher explained it today but didnt do it too well and were all confused.And to clear it up-am i right in saying that Trinity DOSENT need a European language to get in but most of the big ones like UCD do?Thanks.

Mills

Most people do 7 (or even 8) subjects for the leaving cert, but for working out your points total (determines which courses you'll get into or whatever) you use your best 6 subjects, so you only really need to do 6 subjects.

Afaik Trinity doesn't require a european language, all of the NUI colleges (UCD, Maynooth, Unniversity College Cork and Unniversity College Galway) do require a third language as well as english and irish.

lazer

tcd see irish as a european language

Man U babe

I'm doing 8 subjects cos i'm crap at languages, want high points and want to go to UCD. Its a bit stupid that NUI requires english, irish+3rd language, because of this I have to pass english, irish and french to get mathematical science. That doesnt make sense, minimum requirements should be course-specific.

RasTa

i done me leaving last year,done 6 subjects passed them all
droped biology at the start of the year....best choice ever

Nietzschean

i'm doing 8 thats with pass english and pass irish and no real european language....i'd have to agree the current system is very unfair to those people who arn't good at languages (me), like to goto trinity (as i am) i need my pass english and irish...to goto ucd i'd have had to keep pass german aswell...like wtf? i can get an A in phy maths r that...but when it comes to languages no hope....the system favors those with unreal photographic memories....its not really fair..u can get by and get 600pts and not be able to do any hon's sci subject to save yer life........but i can't get by without being able to do lang's at all....like as it is i'm stuck doing businnes...and cause i suck at english it takes huge ammounts of work

Mills

Originally posted by Man U babe
I'm doing 8 subjects cos i'm crap at languages, want high points and want to go to UCD. Its a bit stupid that NUI requires english, irish+3rd language, because of this I have to pass english, irish and french to get mathematical science. That doesnt make sense, minimum requirements should be course-specific.

I couldn't agree more. I'm really, really bad at irish and french and any other foreign languages, yet I'm forced to pass both irish AND a foreign language to do a course that has absolutely nothing to do with languages.

seamus

Originally posted by Man U babe
I'm doing 8 subjects cos i'm crap at languages, want high points and want to go to UCD. Its a bit stupid that NUI requires english, irish+3rd language, because of this I have to pass english, irish and french to get mathematical science. That doesnt make sense, minimum requirements should be course-specific.

No it doesn't make sense. It also doesn't make sense that when you do Engineering in UCD, you must also take a foreign language. Some MEP obviously has a lot of weight in here somewhere..............

Lenny

I'm doing 8, my extra subject is LCVP

cournioni

I'm doing 6. I dropped Irish last year because I wasn't even at foundation level standards. That **** just doesn't make any sense to me.

It helps having the free class though, cos then I can concentrate on studying the other more important subjects.

Victor

I *did* 9

Man U babe

Serialkiller: why did ya pick business if ur crap at english? ur obviously feckin fantastic at maths from your other posts, why didnt ya do accounting? tis boring, I know, but tis numerical.
My friend is doing 9, shes in 5th year. She has to spend nearly all her time studying now, thats no way to be like in 5th year.

smiles

I do 7. Including French and Irish, even though i'm pretty weak at them, but i do need the points (and cant afford to get grinds to do extra classes outside school), so i'm doing honors in both..

<< Fio >>

Victor

Originally posted by Mills
Most people do 7 (or even 8) subjects for the leaving cert, but for working out your points total (determines which courses you'll get into or whatever) you use your best 6 subjects, so you only really need to do 6 subjects.

The problem with only doing 6 is that if you have a bad day on one exam, you may not get the points / other requirements you want. It could affect you for a full year or more.

Stephen

The NUI's are not the end-all and be-all when it comes to college. Maybe you should consider taking a course in one of the many IT's (like me )? They generally place more importance on sciences and the like rather than languages.

I'm studying for a bachelor of science degree in Carlow IT at the moment. Sure, its not Trinity College but it fits my needs

Sangre

Im doing 8 subjects atm and i'm in 5th year. Im doing honours irish now but dropping to pass in 6th year cause i've covered the pass course from the honours course, so nxt year i wont have to open a book so i'm really doing 7 honours but mostly likely english won't be included in it

BTW we have to do an european language so we dont look like thick eejits to the EU who can all speak like 18 differnts languages ( inc. PIg latin) its a bitch but politicans wanna look big :rolleyes:

Da_Kid

I'm in 5th and doin 8:

Irish(hl), English(hl), Maths(hl), App. Maths(hl), French(hl), Chemistry(hl), Physics(hl) and I'm doin art as an extra subject(hl) but I don't even have any lessons in it I'm just gonna shove in a sh itload of stuff and call it a porfolio...

zAbbo

Sorry to tell you this lads but the Leaving Cert ain`t worth the paper it`s printed on, I know lads in my college who got high points and are bottom of the class. It`s been proved that there is no link between high CAO points and Third Level performance. I researched a little before i done my LC and choose 7 subjects no languages or science subject(lying guidance dude was wrong) i`d advise you lot to do the same. I only went to around 4 Geograaphy classes in 2 years and got an Honour (same paper every year)

Best of Luck all the same

Ps. Dont post back sayin that you need points to get into college.(tis true but not the be all and end all)

Stephen

Originally posted by Da_Kid
I'm doin art as an extra subject(hl) but I don't even have any lessons in it I'm just gonna shove in a sh itload of stuff and call it a porfolio...

Um... there is no portfolio required for the LC art course, its not like the junior cert. You'd only need to put a portfolio together if you are planning to go to art college or something similar.

zAbbo

another bragger has been nailed

Nietzschean

Serialkiller: why did ya pick business if ur crap at english? ur obviously feckin fantastic at maths from your other posts, why didnt ya do accounting? tis boring, I know, but tis numerical.

Well i did it cause i was told i wouldn't be able to do accounting in one year.....i really should have taken on technical drawing or something like that......not enuf maths subjects on lc course for my liking

kaimera

Business is all about learning answers basically.

SerialKiller..I doubt if you could pick up Tech. Drawing in a single year.
I did it for the JC but dropped it for teh LC.

Mills

Originally posted by Serialkiller


Well i did it cause i was told i wouldn't be able to do accounting in one year.....i really should have taken on technical drawing or something like that......not enuf maths subjects on lc course for my liking

From friends that do TG I can quite safely say that you wouldn't have a hope of doing it in a year unless you're exceptionally talented at that sort of thing. The 2 guys who are "top of the class" both got Cs in their mocks because they still haven't finished the course properly, and they've been doing it since 4th year (compulsory in my school).

Nietzschean

Well i'm in the sorta place where any subject is doable in a year....4mts even in some cases.......but none the less i could have done it...was v. good at it for JC

Man U babe

Fully agree not enuf maths subjects on LC, in A-levels they have separate 'further maths', 'statistics', 'mechanics' courses, twould be a good way to replace eng irish and french!
Spose ur right,accounting is too long to do in 1 year, were still not finished and theres like 12 days of classes left before LC in my school.

Raskolnikov

The purpose of the leaving cert is to give students a board education that will help them decide where they would like to specialize when they go to college. The difference between the system here and in Britain is that they decide where they want to specialize at a much younger age which in my opinion is a bad thing because once you pick your subjects you can't change them.

Celt

Originally posted by Mills


From friends that do TG I can quite safely say that you wouldn't have a hope of doing it in a year unless you're exceptionally talented at that sort of thing. The 2 guys who are "top of the class" both got Cs in their mocks because they still haven't finished the course properly, and they've been doing it since 4th year (compulsory in my school).

I'm doing tech in 5'th year, it's hard but once you revise it's easy enough

Nietzschean

The purpose of the leaving cert is to give students a board education that will help them decide where they would like to specialize when they go to college. The difference between the system here and in Britain is that they decide where they want to specialize at a much younger age which in my opinion is a bad thing because once you pick your subjects you can't change them.

fair enuf but i shouldn't have to get examined on them in an exam that will decide so much in my life...its quite impossible for me to do well in those subjects even if i had another 5yrs doing them....so like i should be able to opt out and just do stuff i can actually do...current sys is way unfair on me poor brain...its logical and abstract think'n only....i can't do all dat language stuff unless its programming languages...but then they are logical and based on math..... l

seamus

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
The purpose of the leaving cert is to give students a board education that will help them decide where they would like to specialize when they go to college. The difference between the system here and in Britain is that they decide where they want to specialize at a much younger age which in my opinion is a bad thing because once you pick your subjects you can't change them.

That's a fair point, but I disagree that it would be too young over here. Most British people finish their A-Levels at 16/17, but most irish people finish their leaving at 18/19 - that year would make a hell of a lot of difference.

Personally I had a rough time starting the LC cycle. In fifth year I only turned up for half of the days, and subsequently got suspended for same. Basically I was bored and frustrated with having to do subjects that
1. I didn't like
2. I wasn't very good at.

If we were given a choice at the start of fifth year as to say, 4 subjects we can do, I think it would be far better. Even if you don't know what you want to do, you would pick the subjects you like the most, or are interested in the most, which tend to also be the subjects you are good at. IMHO, No-one gets any better or more interested in a subject after 3rd year. Sometimes maybe, but generally not. I was no better at French or Irish by the end of 6th year than I was at the end of third year, despite having done 2 years more work for them. They were a waste of my time. And I'm sure plenty of people are in the same boat with maths or english or Business.

Just IMO, it doesn't make sense that people would have to study subjects to help them get a course that won't involve that subject whatsoever. Take SerialKiller there. If there was say a Computing foundations course on the leaving cert, he could do mayeb that, maths, english and some other technical discipline (electronics maybe), and he would be far better prepared to enter a computers course in college than he would be now.

Just my 2c