IS THE Leaving Certificate Applied a "real" Leaving Certificate? How fair is the points system? What do employers want from schools? These are just some of the questions posed in the inaugural issue of the ASTI's new education journal Issues in Education, which takes the senior cycle as its chosen theme.
In her overview of the developments in senior cycle over the past 30 years, Aine Hyland, professor of education at UCC, notes that the number of students participating in senior cycle has risen from 25 000 in 1964 to over 157,000 today - a sixfold increase.
In 1964, 24,000 students were enrolled on the Leaving Certificate course and about 1,000 were enrolled in vocational/technical programmes. Today, 134,0000 are following general senior-cycle courses and almost 24,000 are enrolled on vocational/technical courses, mostly Post-Leaving Certificate courses in the vocational sector.
In 1964, there were 26 subjects on the Leaving Certificate programme.
Thirty years on, there are 36 subjects, but Hyland says that this apparent growth is largely explained by the development of options within some subject areas.
The biggest changes in subject up-take have occurred in the classical subjects. In 1964, 88 per cent of boys studied Latin in the senior cycle; today the corresponding figure is 0.5 per cent. The situation in relation to girls has also changed somewhat with a small improvement in areas that were entirely shunned by girls in 1964. For instance, the proportion of girls taking physics has increased from two per cent 30 years ago to over nine per cent in 1994.
In his article on the Leaving Certificate Applied, Niel Bray, a post-primary teacher working with the support service for the LCA, states that the success of the LCA will depend on how motivated teachers are.
"The evidence to date suggests that there is such a lot of motivation around on which to build not only a new `real' Leaving Certificate, but, perhaps, with apologies to Fergal Quinn, a Super Leaving Certificate," he writes.
The journal includes an article by Eilis Humphreys, of the Transition Year Support team, which looks at the contribution of Transition Year to whole school development. Eamon Stack, assistant chief inspector (post-primary) in the Department of Education, writes about senior cycle reform, while Daniel O'Hare, president of Dublin City University, discusses multiple intelligences - three subjects with challenging implications for Irish education.
In all, there are 16 articles which, to borrow the words of Dr Padraig Hogan, guest editor, "should be seen as contributions to an ongoing and important conversation among teachers". This journal is essential reading for anyone interested in the changing senior cycle.
