The way forward for LC2021

PoolDude · 14-02-2021 08:42PM

Treppen wrote: »

Giving a rough band is a lot easier than giving an exact % which is what was asked last time. Even then you'll have borderline students who could get H1 or H2 on the day. Not every student exists exactly in the middle of each grade band. Once the Mocks are in you've a better idea. But still won't know for certain what they'd get in the LC... although you kind of know who the definite 100%ers are if you are lucky to get them.

So ya I think I could confidently predict a grade band for about 20% of students . The rest, I wouldn't like to , unless they had mocks and filled all their exam papers.
Class tests before Christmas were important but definitely not a LC predictor... I used them more as a teaching tool.

Will the Unions want teachers to give grades then rather than exact %?

Also hadn’t realised there was no further contact once CG were announced last year. I guess with there being an exam this year that’ll have to change. Theyll be as nice as pie till the deadline for submitting your predictions. When that is I guess is dependent on whether they want to tell students the results before the written exams or not

Treppen · 14-02-2021 09:14PM

PoolDude wrote: »

Will the Unions want teachers to give grades then rather than exact %?

It's hard to say. If there's banding then there's going to be bunching if you're unsure you might put them into the higher band to be safe, whereas if you've to give exact % you might be more inclined to leave it around the borderline. Although given last year's bumping nobody knows what way it'll go, maybe an algorithm will throw them all into the tumble dryer again, and out pops a nicely adjusted bell curve distribution.

If a written exam in June or July is tied into that then it should be a good moderator for predicted grades. I could assume it would do away with the need for any of this algorithm nonsense of junior cert grades class history, school profiling. Class ranking.

But I did hear a stats guy from UL who said, ya just allocate bands and let the CAO take care of the rest by a lottery . Every year there was a lottery anyway with the lowest qualified candidates who had equal points.

PoolDude wrote: »

Also hadn’t realised there was no further contact once CG were announced last year. I guess with there being an exam this year that’ll have to change. Theyll be as nice as pie till the deadline for submitting your predictions. When that is I guess is dependent on whether they want to tell students the results before the written exams or not

No way should they tell students predicted grades before the exam. Treat it like Easter practicals and orals etc.

What purpose would it serve? Unless of course if the students still want that notion of choosing between either PG or Sat exams... and then use either for CAO. That wouldn't sit well with me, but it might be a case of 'give them whatever they want' with the minister and anxious parents.

solerina · 14-02-2021 09:40PM

Rosita wrote: »

1) Yes, but exams normally judge that. That's my point - anything other than an actual exam is still made up.

2) Easy, I had 4 sets of credible relevant extended-length exam results. They also plugged in their Junior Cert grade later. (It was still of course a made up grade as distinct from a sat exam grade, which was reflected generally, it seems, in grade inflation).

3) Because of a reluctance on the part of the government to insist on regular written LC exams.

Totally made up, I 100% agree with you.
I have a 120 min fifth year exam from November 2019, it tested about 6 chapters.
I have a 120 min test from Nov 2020 which tested all of fifth year and a bit of sixth year.
Outside of that I have numerous end of chapter tests but how can you base a LC grade on those ?
For instance one lad in my class always gets 85% or above in the chapter tests got 66% in the Nov 2020 test and this test was the only one in the last year that assessed more than 1-2 chapters. Do I grade him at 66% ??? Bet his parents would be in straight away, but that’s the only semi realistic exam I have and it was way too short !!

Dickie10 · 14-02-2021 11:48PM

biggest issue now is numbers of cases stubbornly high still around 1000 mark. it will take another month to get down to 200 cases best possible scenario but in a month we could be 500-600. what do we do then? i wouldnt be happy at all going into a classroom with 500+ cases a day

Rosita · 15-02-2021 12:57AM

Dickie10 wrote: »

biggest issue now is numbers of cases stubbornly high still around 1000 mark. it will take another month to get down to 200 cases best possible scenario but in a month we could be 500-600. what do we do then? i wouldnt be happy at all going into a classroom with 500+ cases a day

Around 70% of cases are associated with the UK variant which is considered more transmissible and dangerous. I think that's why there's no great rush on about schools and why it's nearly a given that level 5 restrictions generally will be there for quite some time. I think the pushing ahead with calculated grades says a lot about the reality of how limited our schooling might be in the coming months if the figures continue to plateau as high as this.

Dickie10 · 15-02-2021 01:07AM

yeah i live with my parents in mid 80s and late 70s wouldnt be at all happy to be going into school setting.my father is getting vaccinated this week first shot on wednesday.

rainbowtrout · 15-02-2021 03:09AM

PoolDude wrote: »

Will the Unions want teachers to give grades then rather than exact %?

Also hadn’t realised there was no further contact once CG were announced last year. I guess with there being an exam this year that’ll have to change. Theyll be as nice as pie till the deadline for submitting your predictions. When that is I guess is dependent on whether they want to tell students the results before the written exams or not

Whatever about what the union want, the DES will want exact percentages to allow them to move grades up and down, so it won't just be plucking a grade from a bunch of H2s in a school at random and moving them down to H3...

rainbowtrout · 15-02-2021 03:11AM

Treppen wrote: »

It's hard to say. If there's banding then there's going to be bunching if you're unsure you might put them into the higher band to be safe, whereas if you've to give exact % you might be more inclined to leave it around the borderline. Although given last year's bumping nobody knows what way it'll go, maybe an algorithm will throw them all into the tumble dryer again, and out pops a nicely adjusted bell curve distribution.

If a written exam in June or July is tied into that then it should be a good moderator for predicted grades. I could assume it would do away with the need for any of this algorithm nonsense of junior cert grades class history, school profiling. Class ranking.

The Leaving Cert could produce some odd curves this year then. Could imagine something like OL Irish being a popular one to be a predicted grade for anyone taking it as their 7th subject and doing all HL otherwise.

Wombatman · 15-02-2021 09:47AM

Could maybe try to break bands up into 5% slots, like H1.1, H1.2, H2.1, H2.2 and so on. Maybe even quartiles.

Bobtheman · 15-02-2021 10:10AM

I'm dreading it. I have a few test results and essays but I ain't the most organised teacher in terms of paperwork.
I know what I'm doing for each class but where I put the results is another thing!
In the end I will inflate like a tyre.
Im not a SEC Examiner.
As for knowing this might happen I disagree.
We were fed the mantra of schools will be kept open blah blah blah

ascophyllum · 15-02-2021 10:52AM

For my LC group, the last time they undertook an assessment which tested various sections of the subject was Christmas of 5th Year. No summer 5th Year exam, no Christmas 6th Year formal, no mocks. Lots of 1 or 2 topic tests but students tend to do well in these assessments. It's only when you group topics together into a long 2 hour exam do you see their true grades. And that was December 2019 as I mentioned. I will have to use these smaller assessments but I can not grade down, only upwards in the absence of information, so using this data I will end up with results in the higher range, most will get H1 to H3.
Great you might say, but every single teacher in the country will be in this same situation, the SEC can not simply give the 2021 LC cohort a greatly inflated set of results compared to every other year (imagine a 2021 candidate in 5 years time going for a job against somebody with a 2019 certificate), so they will have to adjust everyone's grades greatly. There will be H1s being pulled down to H3s in this scenario. They will have an almighty mess.

shesty · 15-02-2021 12:31PM

Dickie10 wrote: »

biggest issue now is numbers of cases stubbornly high still around 1000 mark. it will take another month to get down to 200 cases best possible scenario but in a month we could be 500-600. what do we do then? i wouldnt be happy at all going into a classroom with 500+ cases a day

I am actually going to email Stephen Donnelly, and Leo Varadkar this week (no point emailing Michael Martin because his email has some sort of filter on and emails bounce back....says a lot...) and ask them that exact question.

What's their plan if we can't get any lower than maybe 500 a week by the end of March? Can they accept that prolonged lockdown periods don't work?(and the likelihood is that is where we will end up as we BARELY achieved 200 a week back in November, and rates are falling extremely slowly here now). What will they do next, when they have nowhere else left to go with their rules??? And I don't mean just in relation to schools, I mean in relation to everything. Especially in the context of vaccinations being rolled out.They can come up with all the new "Living with Covid" plans that they like, but if we can't reach low digit numbers in the dead of winter after a prolonged - very prolonged - lockdown, the plans are meaningless.

Seriously, I want to know. Genuinely. It is time we started calling them out on this.

Bobtheman · 15-02-2021 12:48PM

To be fair to all in Government they are taking this day by day. They can't say exactly how schools will open until they see the figures towards the end of the week. They cant guess next weeks figures. There has been no definite statement from NPHET yet on schools.
Teachers are born planners-given the alternative is chaos in the classroom but we just have to wait.
As for the SEC-predicated grades the wrong route. They should hold exams in July.
But that rational route has gone because 18-year-olds are upset.
Nevermind the thousands of deaths. The delays in cancer treatment. The businesses that will never open etc.
God forbid-teenagers might just have to be patient!!

shesty · 15-02-2021 01:12PM

Well they are taking it day by day, but the question of case numbers potentially not improving is bigger than just schools reopening - it impacts society at large. I myself would just like to know that if they do not see the numbers coming down to sub-100 by April some time (which I feel is very aspirational - just my own view), then have they considered what happens next? Track record so far would suggest that contingency planning in general is most certainly not their strong point. I think it is a reasonable question to ask have they given consideration to what might be done in society at large in the event that numbers persist at a level higher than they would be happy with?

Knowing Irish people, while we won't come out and protest against restrictions, we will just start to ignore them and bend them for our own purposes. That point is being reached already. Resulting in a catch 22 where we have all these restrictions in place, but numbers aren't reducing because of the view that they are essentially someone else's problem and can be interpreted as each individual sees fit, given they have gone on so long. We have a fairly long history of that type of behaviour, let's face it.

rainbowtrout · 15-02-2021 01:43PM

Wombatman wrote: »

Could maybe try to break bands up into 5% slots, like H1.1, H1.2, H2.1, H2.2 and so on. Maybe even quartiles.

You mean like we used to have? A1, A2, B1, B2......

rainbowtrout · 15-02-2021 01:50PM

shesty wrote: »

Well they are taking it day by day, but the question of case numbers potentially not improving is bigger than just schools reopening - it impacts society at large. I myself would just like to know that if they do not see the numbers coming down to sub-100 by April some time (which I feel is very aspirational - just my own view), then have they considered what happens next? Track record so far would suggest that contingency planning in general is most certainly not their strong point. I think it is a reasonable question to ask have they given consideration to what might be done in society at large in the event that numbers persist at a level higher than they would be happy with?

Knowing Irish people, while we won't come out and protest against restrictions, we will just start to ignore them and bend them for our own purposes. That point is being reached already. Resulting in a catch 22 where we have all these restrictions in place, but numbers aren't reducing because of the view that they are essentially someone else's problem and can be interpreted as each individual sees fit, given they have gone on so long. We have a fairly long history of that type of behaviour, let's face it.

Assuming vaccinations work as they are supposed to, you will see a lot less people dying and being hospitalised. That really is the aim of the vaccination. It doesn't matter so much for the 90% of people who don't have serious medical issues arising from covid.

Given that the deaths are overwhelmingly in the 80+ age category, I would expect to see the death rate decrease in the coming months, and hospitalisations with it.

rainbowtrout · 15-02-2021 01:50PM

Dickie10 wrote: »

biggest issue now is numbers of cases stubbornly high still around 1000 mark. it will take another month to get down to 200 cases best possible scenario but in a month we could be 500-600. what do we do then? i wouldnt be happy at all going into a classroom with 500+ cases a day

We were in classrooms in October when it was 1200-1500 cases a day....

thegreatescape · 15-02-2021 02:03PM

rainbowtrout wrote: »

We were in classrooms in October when it was 1200-1500 cases a day....

The new variant makes up a majority of the cases today and is more transmissable, different scenario to that back in October IMO

Rosita · 15-02-2021 02:26PM

shesty wrote: »

What's their plan if we can't get any lower than maybe 500 a week by the end of March?

Can they accept that prolonged lockdown periods don't work?

.

I doubt their plans will be very sensitive to precise numbers. The overwhelming majority of cases are now the UK variant strain and I'd say caution will be the order of the day.

The issue that "prolonged lockdowns don't work" is debatable. That depends what they are trying to achieve. They seem to work in keeping transmission under some level of control which it seems to me is really their only aim. Sweden went the opposite route and that has ended disastrously.

Wombatman · 15-02-2021 02:37PM

rainbowtrout wrote: »

You mean like we used to have? A1, A2, B1, B2......

Yes. Only for the purposes of classifying students within a grade. Obviously the substantive grade structure won't change.

This way, unlike last year, multiple students can occupy the same slot. Teachers won't have to agonise over picking one student at the perceived expense of another.

Treppen · 15-02-2021 02:50PM

rainbowtrout wrote: »

You mean like we used to have? A1, A2, B1, B2......

Lol I remember you mentioned that issue of banding on here years ago when the new bands were introduced Rainbowtrout.

rainbowtrout · 15-02-2021 03:02PM

Treppen wrote: »

Lol I remember you mentioned that issue of banding on here years ago when the new bands were introduced Rainbowtrout.

What goes around comes around :pac::pac::pac:

shesty · 15-02-2021 03:07PM

Rosita wrote: »

I doubt their plans will be very sensitive to precise numbers. The overwhelming majority of cases are now the UK variant strain and I'd say caution will be the order of the day.

The issue that "prolonged lockdowns don't work" is debatable. That depends what they are trying to achieve. They seem to work in keeping transmission under some level of control which it seems to me is really their only aim. Sweden went the opposite route and that has ended disastrously.

I would agree with this bit because it seems a very odd thing to do, to tie themselves into case numbers in such a concrete way, however there have been a few quotes in the last week from (I think) Donnelly, and others that they want to be at level A-B of cases before xyz can happen. If I remember correctly, in double digits to consider reopening hospitality, and 100-200 cases a day for other reopenings (I will try and find links). It feels like setting things up for failure, at the rate we are going.

rainbowtrout · 15-02-2021 03:12PM

Wombatman wrote: »

Yes. Only for the purposes of classifying students within a grade. Obviously the substantive grade structure won't change.

This way, unlike last year, multiple students can occupy the same slot. Teachers won't have to agonise over picking one student at the perceived expense of another.

But last year (for better or worse) we were allowed mark them out of 1000, which meant that we could give them a mark to two decimal points in order to separate out students. Which ultimately was pointless, as it's entirely possible for two students to score the exact same mark on an exam, so it should have been possible to give two students the same score.

Dividing 10% bands into two or four is just another way of describing ranking. The student getting 84.5 gets a B1 (in old money) and the student that gets 85 gets an A2. Any teacher will get you though that if you are comparing those two students on a day to day basis in school that they are probably evenly matched, some days on class tests Student A gets 1% higher, some days it's Student B, and some days they get the same.

Bobtheman · 15-02-2021 03:23PM

You could actually switch off your news for a few days and avoid the following
1.Government makes an announcement on something
2.Outrage or holes found in plan
3.Government abandons plan

deiseindublin · 15-02-2021 03:54PM

I sound like a broken record asking, but can anyone read between the lines and figure out if:
1. Students will be given the choice and have to pick in advance, or
2. Student will be given all CGs, and then have the option of sitting the exam or not?

The OR can mean anything.

pandoraj09 · 15-02-2021 07:00PM

So I've just heard that the orals are set to go ahead on April 12th ie the first day back after the Easter holidays. I was sure they'd be cancelled. Anyone else hear this?

Bobtheman · 15-02-2021 07:01PM

I suspect this will be part of the plan
Kids get PG in Early May.
Kids can accept Predicted grade or do an exam in late June.

Im only guessing here but I suspect it will be along those lines.

Treppen · 15-02-2021 07:07PM

deiseindublin wrote: »

I sound like a broken record asking, but can anyone read between the lines and figure out if:
1. Students will be given the choice and have to pick in advance, or
2. Student will be given all CGs, and then have the option of sitting the exam or not?

The OR can mean anything.

Nobody knows what's the end plan but what I will say is :

1. Predicted grades only won't really wash with a lot of teachers, as in, how do I predict a leaving cert grade based on a few class tests or absent students etc.
2. See 1

Treppen · 15-02-2021 07:08PM

Bobtheman wrote: »

I suspect this will be part of the plan
Kids get PG in Early May.
Kids can accept Predicted grade or do an exam in late June.

Im only guessing here but I suspect it will be along those lines.

What if a teacher says, sorry not enough info to go on!

The way forward for LC2021

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