'Concern' over distribution of LC Results

Ellis Curved Driver wrote: »

Teachers will be there because school will be back anyway?

But if it wasn't, why would they turn up to say "make a data access request" to their students looking for answers?

I don't get your point tbh in the context of current information.

My point is in relation to a number of posts on this thread about teachers not being available to students on results day.

Treppen wrote: »

Going by what Norma said then do you think they propose to bump up 7% of H2 Girls to bring them in line with the H1 stats. Then maybe have to move them again based on Socio Economic Status of the girls?

From my understanding everything was written into the previous school's past performance ( and you can include the 9 grounds + whatever else in that). So it would be past grade performance only was the influencing factor for the dept. to adjust the grade. It seems a dangerous step to be pushing these grades around for more than 1 variable. Horse by committee and all that.

I have no idea how they are going to do it to be honest. My best guess is that if results this year are generally in line with previous years for each school then the other factors such as gender and socio-economic status should fall into place. I presume this is more of a cross check to make sure nothing is out of kilter, because the media will be all over it like a rash if it's discovered that the most affluent parts of the country got more H1s than usual and girls grades in HL maths are down or whatever.

It wouldn't take much to cause a shift in the curve nationally. E.g. say all the schools in the D4 area submitted grades with one more H1 in each class than the norm, and because it didn't push the grade curve for that school way out then those grades slipped through, but the overall picture for that catchment is that results are way up on normal.

Or if in mixed schools across the country HL Maths teachers typically got 3 H1s every year, and they all still submitted 3 H1s, only that they all gave them to two boys and one girl, so that bore out in the gender split for that grade, but it was found that nationally typically it was usually half and half, then it would indicate that there was some gender bias at play in awarding grades for such a radical departure from the norm, which won't be necessarily picked up just going on the schools overall results year on year.

That's what I imagine it is trying to prevent happening. It's still going to be a mess and the DES don't do themselves any favours drip feeding this information to people through the media without any background context.

Turbohymac wrote: »

Unfortunately every year with a long time back LC grades are being rounded up to actually increase the students results..this year there was no pleasing the students whether they sat their exams or were marked on their past academic performance...
This year unfortunately there will be many students getting way more points than they would have got if they had to sit the exams.. this will result in many students getting onto college courses that they normally wouldn't have got..
This can't be good

No it won't. If points increase because students are given higher grades, then points for courses will also increase. Colleges don't set the points for a course. Points are determined by the lowest scoring applicant who got the last place in the course. If there are 30 places on a course, the 30 applicants with the highest points get offered the places, if the person who is no. 30 on the list scores 500 then the points for the course are 500. If 29 of the people on the course scored 500 or above and person 30 scores 325, then the points for the course are 325.

And LC grades are not being rounded up, they are generally similar each year.

Turbohymac wrote: »

Rainbowtrout..sorry but I know for definate that results are being rounded upwards..all depending on how the corrections are tallying up..
And yet regardless of this certain students still feel hard done..
Sorry but facts are true

Would you like to provide a source for that ‘fact’?

Turbohymac wrote: »

Rainbowtrout..sorry but I know for definate that results are being rounded upwards..all depending on how the corrections are tallying up..

Could you explain this please? Preferably in detail, because you’re not being very clear.

Turbohymac wrote: »

Hi rainbowtrout..yes correcting officials from the department regularly contact the teachers that are marking the various exam bundles and advise to increase upwards..I've never heard a request to mark down any papers..this is going on with years as I have knowledge of this going on since 2012/13 ..this to me seems a farce and clearly makes the whole department and teachers look as if there doing a much better job than is actually the case.. without the department marking upwards certain lower scoring individuals there would clearly be an awful lot more young people either clearly failing to obtain enough points for chosen college courses or having to repeat the lc and cluttering the secondary school system..
This is absolutely accurate rainbowtrout. And I ain't picking a fight with anyone I'm just clearly stating facts ..I'm not apologizing to anyone for speaking the truth ..even if its something that certainly the department of education or teachers may not like..
AND its absolutely not the correcting teachers fault.. BUT clearly if the points/results weren't increased at the lower end there would clearly be a lot of poor results and then many parents would be angry with the teachers..who clearly shouldn't be held accountable for every single student that fails to achieve.. sometimes these students just don't care or put any effort into learning ..but yet every parent expects their child to do well..
My point for the very last time.. all exams should be scored to reflect the individual students merits..this ain't happening.. if there was a cycle race and I was 10 seconds behind the winner .would it be ok to reduce my time by those 10 seconds and bring me up level with what should have clearly been the race winner..
No moaning or cover ups just clear facts.. is it much benefit upgrading results to get them over the line? (college) and of course once these students get to college or should be called partyland for lots. them then its just 3 or 4 years more and then more moaning when they clearly don't perform..
Bottom line LC results should be accurate.. but there not...

Ah, someone doesn't understand how the curve works.

You need to educate yourself on how the bell curve works, and consider the fact that marks are adjusted because the relative difficulty of papers from year to year can be different.

Your analogy of the cycle race is incredibly poor and uninformed and doesn't actually explain what is happening in the marking of the Leaving Cert at all.

You presenting something you know nothing about as facts when you clearly have no understanding of basic statistical concepts is laughable.


But I'm sure you can comfort yourself at night because you have 'the facts' and you know it is going on, by the way the DES have nothing to do with the state exams....





As someone who has marked exams for 19 years,... I await further instructions from my overlords/department officials :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

I also correct. We are in constant contact with our supervising examiners to ensure marking is accurate and slips or complacency don't set in. Also there can be borderline answers that you need advice on.

My examiner doesn't know what bundle any paper comes from until they call that paper to check it so I have no idea how they would ask me to increase the grades for specific bundles....most schools would have more than one centre number too. It would be impossible to be sure where they came from.

The curve is applied to ensure we don't see massive varience in subjects year on year, to keep points somewhat stable so students understand rohghtly what they are aiming for. The assumption is the cohort of 60000 plus students sitting and exam one year should have approximately the same mean and stardard deviation as those in previous year. Papers are strange, for instance the Biology paper at HL last year contained 2 questions that were no longer on the course, hence many students got 50% on the question for just attempting it, therefore section B came out a little high in initial marking...this needs to be adjusted so ensure grade inflation doesn't occur. The Sec do a solid job of keeping things constant and are unbelievably principled, I've had half an hour conversations around 3 marks questions with advising examiners for a student neither of us knows or will ever meet because we want the system to be fair. This is the contact your may be aware of, contact designed to ensure I'm doing my job marking the exams correctly and that I have the support of another person to ask with more experience who then in turn has another person to ask who again has more experience.

The Department of Education also do not employ me or have anything to do with me during correcting. My employer is the SEC in Athlone, for taxes, payroll and HR. From my experience in education in Ireland, if the SEC were running the show I'd be a damn sight more confident in the outcomes being beyond reproach. They would also be on time

Turbohymac wrote: »

Jeepers this is a fair thorny subject..

I wonder why. :rolleyes:

Turbohymac wrote: »

I actually never thought that a moderator would hit the nail on the head..

Seems like you have a pretty low regard for moderators. Regardless, shesty (I assume that that's the moderator in question) might have hit the nail on the head, but they didn't back your point up. They merely pointed out that when points are low, students get in who aren't really able for the course, and they drop out. I don't see how that supports your notion about grade inflation at all. If grade inflation was going on, you'd expect to see the people with the inflated grades dropping out, sure, but the points would be high, not low.

Turbohymac wrote: »

yes I'm well aware of people on here that have previously corrected/marked exam papers for centuries by the sound of things ..

You've been corrected on the correct word to use to describe the process you're talking about, but you're still trying to shoehorn in the incorrect one. Just as well you're not being marked on this.

Turbohymac wrote: »

but it's a fairly sad reflection if all ye can waffle off is that nobody contacts them during corrections..

Who's saying that? Nobody has said that. What people have said is that nobody from the department contacts the examiners during the marking process, which is true. As has been pointed out, the department have nothing to do with setting the exams, running the exams, marking the exams, or anything to do with the exams, really.

Turbohymac wrote: »

I'm very close to someone who also carries out corrections and I'm standing solid on my claims..
yes regular contact during correction .

If you meant that someone from the SEC contacts the examiners, then yes, that is the truth. The advising examiner, and on rare occasions, the chief advising examiner or chief examiner might contact them, but they don't contact them and tell them that they need to bring their marks up because the overall marks are coming in too low.

If your friend is being told to bring their marks up on a regular basis, what that usually means is that your friend is not applying the marking scheme properly, and needs to improve their marking. An advising examiner might tell them that the marks are coming in too low, so as not to hurt your friend's feelings. It's not very good man-management to tell someone that they're crap at their job and need to shape up. Advising examiners are not supposed to tell examiners how the results are looking, overall, because it might cause the examiner to mark harder or easier as a result, and this will lead to more work for the advising examiner and more for the examiner when they need to fix it.
It sounds, to me, like your friend might not be a very good examiner. Hard to tell though, based on second hand information (which is what you're basing your "facts" on, by the way).

Turbohymac wrote: »

However passing nasty derogatory remarks on my level of education only reflects on some self claimed and so called Educated individuals within this community.
After these posts all I can say is fair play to the moderator... for posting a non judgmental post.. unlike the self claimed experts that stupidly think they know all..

Nobody has questioned your education although, ironically, you have now questioned ours ("so called Educated individuals"). It was recommended that you educate yourself on statistics and bell curves, since you seem to want to wade into this discussion, without the relevant expertise with which to do so. I don't know what you do for a living, but if I barrelled into a discussion about it, spouting falsehoods and half-truths, and insisting that they're facts, because "I'm very close to someone who also [does whatever you do, and they told me about it]", you'd probably tell me, quite calmly, that what I was saying was nonsense, and that I should educate myself more on the subject before weighing in in a discussion of something else that's vaguely related to what I think I know about, which is being discussed by people who are actually experts in that field.
It was not a reflection on your level of education. You can't be an expert in everything. What you can do is not try to act like an expert in subjects you don't have any expertise in.

Pistachio19 wrote: »

They registered on the portal and confirmed their preferred level for each subject weeks ago. They were advised at that point that they would still have to opt in at a later stage, that date wasn't given until last week. No idea why as surely they'll all opt in for the predicted grades anyway - nothing to lose.

Presume some will opt out to force the exams to take place. I'm sure there's a few that do want to sit them, and there's a few that will be doing it on principal.