The Leaving Cert Is A Form Of Slavery

Chaotic_Forces wrote: »

For the leaving? You realize you could have refused to attend since the state only requires maths, Irish and english

Being a 15 year old at the time I did question it (just for the sake of being a know-it-all little bollocks who thought he was a rebel) but didn't really care. Besides, I liked geography and the teacher was a good guy so would only have been kicking up a fuss about a subject I wanted to do anyway.

I might not like a lot of what the leaving cert encourages (rote memorization and no individual ideas) but in a lot of ways it is a fair system. Its not really based on intelligence and not on money, its based on who is willing to give up their free time and spend it working. If you work hard you will do well, if you don't you won't.

UsernameInUse wrote: »

For example, we should do away with the Leaving Cert and let the individual colleges set their own standards. If you don't get the points you quite need to do, say medicine for example, you can pay to do it regardless of points.
This is a far better system. Most of us don't even realise what we're interested in doing, nor take it seriously enough until our twenties.

?

You do realise that you can 'pay' for a degree in medicine after you get your first undergraduate degree? It is competitive to get into but its not a case that you can't do what you want. If you have the money you certainly can, just get another sort of degree first preferably science and then do medicine.

yawha wrote: »

This. 1,000,000 times.

Yes, you can do well by learning off essays, or rote learning a load of facts without understanding them, but crucially, you don't have to.

I wrote all my own essays for the LC. I read prescribed texts several times and made my own mind up about them rather than reading some notes. I did short story questions despite teachers warning me off them because they were "hard to do well in". I made sure I thoroughly understood everything in maths and the sciences.

Honestly, I feel I got a hell of a lot out of the LC, because I applied myself, exercised my creativity, expressed my own opinion and thoroughly understood everything.

Just because you can do very well pointswise the lazy/dumb way doesn't mean you have to.

Unfortunately, while I often received praise from them for my original approach, I never had a teacher in second level who actively advocated that we should try to learn this way as opposed to the rote learning method.

I completely agree with both the posts listed. I had a similar view on Irish and English and for all of the prescribed texts and essays I would take my own opinion on it rather than reading notes. Yes, you do have to learn a few quotes and facts to support yourself but teachers and correctors are so impressed by the individual's initiative to take their own approach on things and do a proper analysis that they will be refreshed by your paper.

As for science and maths subjects, if you haven't learned a particular experiment or definition or theorem off, as long as you understand you may well be able to figure it out yourself or will at least get some good attempt marks for it. Remember, the actual answer to maths questions is only worth 3 marks most of the time. You can get 15-17 out of 20 marks for the hardest questions on a maths paper for producing a good attempt at them, provided you understand it and get around it logically.

As for people paying to get into college rather than working, I completely disagree. That is ridiculous. I was one of the hardest workers in my year and I would not be in college now were it not for the points system.
That said, I don't particularly agree with it but it is not as bad as some people make it out to be. It does measure how badly you want to study at 3rd level, if anything. Too many students put off laziness with the excuse 'it's an unfair system.' Yes, it's unfair, but it's the system so you just have to make the best of it :P

The Leaving Certificate is just the first taste of how difficult life is going to become after you finish secondary school i.e. that you will have to motivate yourself, do the work yourself and balance priorities effectively.

To say you should pay to get into your course is ridiculous. Not only would it discriminate against the people who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them but it also give students the idea that you don't have to work for anything in life but simply pay for it instead.

In my opinion the leaving certificate is to test whether you are a hard worker and are determined to do your best, which is essential for later life.

I agree that subjects should be weighted or that you should be able to choose exactly what six subjects you do in the lc i.e what is relevant to your course. So for example, if you really like languages and intend to do a language course you should be able to swap say maths for an additional language or if you wanted to do a science course you should be able to swap irish and french for a science subject like agricultural science. In other words you should be allowed pick subjects that play into your strengths so you are more likely to get the course you want AND will enjoy.

I am naturally bad at languages and due to irish and french I didn't get the points for the course I wanted. So though I would never support the Lc being scrapped it would be beneficial to change it.

partyatmygaff wrote: »

The amount of rubbish being peddled in this thread is unbelievable.

I don't know when all of you sat your Leaving Cert but I am sitting mine this year. I can tell you with utmost surety that getting an A1 in ANY subject by just rote learning is incredibly difficult if not impossible.

The people who memorise essays and answers do not do well in the Leaving Cert. They may pass and they may even get a C or perhaps even a low B but nothing more than that.

I agree that for most subjects rote learning isn't enough to get an A1, you must have some understanding to effectively answer questions especially in maths. I just did my leaving certificate 2 years ago so not that long ago at all and in fairness I did use rote learning for honours english because it was my weakest subject and I came out with an A2. I think the way english is corrected is very much 'tick the box' style which doesn't allow much room for creativity or personal opinion.

UsernameInUse wrote: »

If you don't get the points you quite need to do, say medicine for example, you can pay to do it regardless of points.

Money doesn't buy brains. You may want to be a doctor, but if you can't do basic maths, have no competency in biology, how the fook will you be a good doctor? You'll be wasting space for someone who could be studying.

UsernameInUse wrote: »

Yes.

Lol, getting paid to work now counts as slavery?

So what about the few thousand Africans who were enslaved for years in America? Was what happened to them equatable to what happens to workers today?

Lyra Fangs wrote: »

In fairness I think secondary school in general is a complete waste of time. I'm in college at the moment and I've used nothing I learnt in sec school for my course. I don't speak a word of irish or french, use basic maths, never use anything from history or geography and I use very little from the science subjects.

I think sec school should be completely redesigned so that it's actually related to what will be done in college. So for example, in first year you could do a variety of different subjects to see which you prefer (maths, engineering, biology, introdutory sociology, introductory media studies). Then in second year you could narrow them down fom say 10 to 7. And then do the jc in third year. For the senior years you could narrow your core subjects down from 7 to 5, e.g if you like science you could do physics, biology, chemistry, maths and english but then do 2 additional minor subjects like report writing and lab tecnhiques or if you liked the humanities you could do english, general sociology, general psychology, research methods and maths with minors essay writing/report writing and online research. You could do assigments for the 2 minors and sit a lc for the five major subjects.

I get that you pretty much have to know what you want to do early on but I just think such a set-up would be a million times more helpful in college than the current curriculum. (at least for me ).

That's all fine and well for people who are academic and have clear and well defined aims. The problem is that the majority of secondary school students do not have clear or well defined aims.

UsernameInUse wrote: »

Everybody in this thread is completely missing the point.

It has absolutely nothing to do with the Leaving being difficult or 'it's harder when you start working in real life'. The problem is that it restricts people from doing what they want to do in life. It's a case of human freedom - if people want to go to the best school, pay for it. Live your dream.

The Leaving Cert restricts people from doing what they want to do in life? I wanted to do Medicine when I finished school but I didn't get the points. I was devastated and went on to do something I liked, but didn't really love and subsequently dropped out of. Medicine is still my dream, but due to health issues, study is on hold for me atm, but I will get there some day.

The Leaving Cert is not, by any means at all, what stops people from doing what they want in life. What stops people, plain and simple, is something entirely different and that's called laziness. If a person wants something badly enough, they won't sit around making excuses about not being able to do it, especially shit ones like your argument.