OVER 50,000 students begin their Leaving Cert this morning, but the new exam timetable - designed to be more "user-friendly'' - is already drawing fierce criticism.
The revised timetable will see the main subjects spread out more evenly across the 13-day schedule, with most students taking just one paper today and tomorrow.
Last year, Labour described the old timetable as a form of "wanton cruelty'', with some higher level students spending over 28 hours in the exam hall during the first week.
This year's timetable has already been labelled as "unfair" and "discriminatory". Students of home economics, chemistry and geography - who have contacted The Irish Times in recent days - complain they are at a significant disadvantage facing into six exams in three days. Other students, they say, can look forward to half-days and extra revision time for their subjects.
In all, over 113,000 students - including 57,000 Junior Cert students - will sit exams in 4,600 centres. Over the June bank holiday weekend, superintendents took possession of the boxes containing the three million exam papers which will be used over the exam period.
Leaving Cert exams will be taken in 89 subjects. Native speakers from across the EU will sit examinations in their mother tongue at Leaving Certificate level in 15 non-curricular languages, including Polish, Lithuanian, Romanian and Latvian.
The examinations run until Thursday June 19th for Junior Cert, and Friday 20th June for the Leaving Cert.
Leaving Cert results will be available on Wednesday, August 13th next. Junior Cert results will be available in mid-September.
Last night Richard Langford, chairman of the State Examinations Commission, advised students to approach the examinations calmly and positively.
Yesterday, Minister for Education Batt O'Keeffe insisted the Leaving Cert was not being "dumbed down''.
However, he also promised to examine research on the trends in Leaving Cert grades and conduct a fuller review if this were deemed necessary.
Mr O'Keeffe said he believed students were working harder and were now smarter, helped by the professional approach of their teachers, better study aids and new updated courses in many subjects.
The latest research - published last week - shows the number of A and B grades in many higher level subjects in the Leaving Cert has doubled since 1991.
