High hopes: the ups and downs of Leaving Cert 2014

Maths

Last year, examiners and teachers watched nervously as the controversial Project Maths syllabus faced its first real test. This year, the syllabus has had time to bed down – so how did the class of 2014 fare?

Over the past three years, the numbers taking higher level maths have risen significantly, with students drawn by the carrot of 25 bonus CAO points for an honours grade. These extra points can make all the difference in securing the right college place – although the effect of bonus points has been to drive up CAO points for the majority of courses.

Progress has been made since 2013. This year, 14,326 students (27 per cent) sat the higher level maths paper, a proportionate rise of 1 per cent from last year. The overall honours rate has stayed reasonably steady, dipping from 72.9 per cent in 2013 to 72.6 per cent this year. In total, 13,660 students who secured an A, B, C or D will receive 25 bonus points today, which may in turn lead to a further rise in CAO points.

Science

Is teh science syllabus too difficult, or is it simply that the concepts of physics and chemistry are particularly challenging? The combined physics & chemistry exam retains the dubious honour of being among the most difficult Leaving Cert subjects, with 11.2 per cent of students failing.

Chemistry and Physics also have relatively high failure rates, at 10 and 8.3 per cent respectively. On the plus side, however, students who have an aptitude for these subjects can receive their just reward: 20.5 per cent of students got A in chemistry and 19.7 per cent took top marks in physics.

Why do these subjects have both a high failure rate and a high number of A grades? It seems likely some students who take them find them tougher than they initially anticipated, whereas students with a gift for figures and science can excel if they work hard.

Biology remains the most popular scihigher level. Just under 70 per cent secured an honours grade, while 24 per cent got D. Almost 7 per cent of students failed the higher level paper.

Tony Donohue, head of education policy with the Irish Business and Employer's Confederation (IBEC), says that despite a small increase in the uptake of chemistry this year, the levels have remained stubbornly low over the past two decades. "Given the pivotal role that science and technology will play in future economic growth, we need to increase the pool of candidates who are qualified to take science subjects at third level. We must modernise the Leaving Cert curriculum, invest in teachers' professional development, and increase the mathematical competence which underpins these subjects. We need a more practical and inquiry-based curriculum which will stimulate young people's interest in these subjects."

Languages

Ireland

still has a serious shortage of qualified language graduates. The financial services sector, as well as big tech firms including

Google

,

Facebook

and

eBay

, are crying out for language graduates. Anyone with knowledge of German, French, Spanish or Italian stands a fairly good chance of walking into a job when they finish their degree.

Meanwhile, demand for emerging market languages including Russian, Japanese, Arabic and, increasingly, Mandarin Chinese, is on the up. Savvy students are expected to gravitate towards language degrees when the CAO first round offers are released next Monday.

Despite the concern that Ireland is failing to produce enough language graduates, however, language subjects consistently have among the highest A and honours rates. French remains by far the most popular language, with 26,496 students sitting the higher or ordinary level papers, compared to 6,858 for German and 5,340 for Spanish.

Although French is more widely available in schools, the numbers taking Spanish have been growing year on year.

At higher level, 74.7 per cent of students secured an honour in French, compared to 79.4 per cent in Spanish and 76.8 in German.

Minority languages have a particularly high honours rate, although this is because most of the students who sit these exams are native speakers. Of the 292 students who took this year’s Russian exam, 97.5 per cent secured an honour, of which a whopping 82.5 per cent secured an A.

Meanwhile, 85.3 per cent of the 108 students who sat Arabic secured an honour, as did 80.8 per cent of 224 who sat the Japanese exam and 80.4 per cent of 249 students who took Italian.

English

A total of 35,121 took this year’s higher level English , while 17,153 sat it at ordinary level. The subject has one of the lowest failure rates, with only 1.3 per cent of higher level students getting an E or less.

It is, however, no mean feat to get an A: just 9.3 per cent of students secured top marks in English whereas, for most other subjects, the A rate is in the double digits.

History and Geography

Unsurprisingly, dropping history and geography as core

Junior Cycle

subjects has led to rumblings of discontent. This year, 77.2 per cent of students who sat higher level history got an honour, while the failure rate was 3.5 per cent.

Among higher level geography students, 75.5 per cent got A, B, or C, and 2.9 per cent failed.

Music to their ears

Students with a natural gift for art or music are, once again, in luck. Aside from Russian, with 292 students, music remains the most likely subject for students to achieve an honour, with 94.6 per cent of higher level students achieving top marks and just 0.5 per cent failing.

This reflects the fact that most of the 5,926 students who sit higher level generally choose it because they have a natural aptitude for it; many are likely to have been playing music since childhood.

Art also has a relatively low failure rate, at just 1.3 per cent, while 79.1 per cent of students secured an honour.

Classic bafflement

Why is the failure rate in classical studies so stubbornly high? On the face of it, this minority subject, with exactly 500 sits in 2014, shouldn’t be any harder than the history paper.

The syllabus covers ancient Greek and Roman history, classical drama, and art and architecture, with students exploring a small number of topics in significant detail.

The failure rate for classical studies is second only to physics & chemistry, with 10 per cent of higher level students not making the grade this year.

This year’s classical studies cohort can take some crumbs of comfort, though: last year’s failure rate was 10.6 per cent.