Students may require higher marks in Leaving Cert maths to gain entry to training colleges for primary teachers, under new measures being considered by Minister for Education Mary Hanafin. They may also require higher standards in English.
The Minister, however, has firmly ruled out any move to abolish the honours Irish requirement for primary teachers. This would, she warned, sound "the death knell" for the language.
The initiative comes amid increasing concern in Government and business circles about declining standards in maths.
About 4,500 students failed ordinary-level maths in the Leaving Cert last year, with a further 5,000 taking foundation level, making them ineligible for most third-level courses. Irish 15-year-olds rank only in mid-table in various OECD international league tables on maths.
At present, students require only a D3 in ordinary-level maths (just over 40 per cent) for primary teaching.
The Minister said: "We know we have a problem with the teaching of maths. There may be an argument for increasing the requirement for Leaving Certificate students going into the training colleges - to a D3 higher level or C3 ordinary level."
Ms Hanafin stressed that while the issue was under consideration, she would take her time before implementing any change. "It is not something I would do without giving a long lead-in time". She was not "going to panic the students" taking the Leaving this year.
Only about 18 per cent of students take higher-level maths, whereas over 60 per cent take honours English. Over 70 per cent of all Leaving Cert students take ordinary level and a further 11 per cent take foundation level.
Last year a review of the subjects proposed a new policy of placing maths questions in an overall practical context and a less "bookish" approach.
The Minister is maintaining the honours Irish requirement for primary teachers, despite figures circulated by Fine Gael which show that less than 4,000 males took honours Irish last year.
Fine Gael's Olwyn Enright said the Minister's campaign to recruit more male teachers is only a PR exercise while 83 per cent of Leaving Cert males without higher-level Irish are "automatically debarred from admission to teacher-training colleges".
Ms Hanafin said these comments were "totally in keeping with Fine Gael's policy of trying to abolish the Irish language".
On English, she said most primary teachers probably already had a grade C or higher at honours level. "The issue with English is not so much qualifications as much as to do with methodologies," she said.
Last night, the INTO's general secretary John Carr said the problems in maths were exaggerated, as various international surveys had shown Irish primary pupils scoring well.
He said the low achievement by some pupils in maths raised questions about learning support and class size.
"The failure of the department to provide a full learning-support service to pupils in primary schools contributes to low achievement," Mr Carr said.
