The Leaving Certificate results released yesterday offer much cause for satisfaction, and indeed relief - in particular because the number of students who achieved an A1 in geography and history are up on last year. These were the subjects which caused the greatest anguish during the examinations in June, leading many candidates to believe that their chances of achieving the requisite points for their college choice had been destroyed. In geography, the percentage of students who gained A1s rose from 1.9 last year to 2.2 per cent. In history, there was an increase from 4.2 to 5 per cent, confounding the dire predictions heard a couple of months ago.
Less immediate, but no less worrying, were the concerns about the numbers of students taking science subjects, especially physics and chemistry, which have been declining over recent years. While the 1999 numbers were again down on last year, this year's results show a dramatic improvement; the percentage achieving the top A1 grade at higher level in physics has more than doubled, while the chemistry results also show a significant improvement. This should please employers and business leaders, as well as the Minister for Education and Science, Mr Martin, who has been promoting these subjects since he came into office. And it should encourage students who consider science subjects "hard" to think again.
This is the first year in which the marking of the Leaving Cert is fully transparent: students are now allowed to view all their marked papers if they have any concerns. One can only speculate about the scale of response to this offer, but since the results are so favourable in the most obvious subjects of concern, the anticipated deluge could well prove to be a trickle.
For the 64,000 students who sat the exam, the next few weeks are crucial. Some 35,000 places will again be available in third-level colleges this year. Decisions about colleges and courses have to be made; if no offers are received next Tuesday, students will have to decide on other options. Obviously, they will wait for the second round of offers and, while there is no official third round this year, further offers will be made to students if and when places on courses become available.
But the gaining of maximum points in the Leaving Cert is no longer the Holy Grail. There are many other options and, increasingly, students and their parents are realising that a place in UCD or TCD is not the only path to a successful career. The further education and training sector has expanded rapidly in the past few years, with around 25,000 openings in the PLC sector, of which 20,000 are first-year places. There are new and better opportunities in apprenticeships, nursing, CERT, Teagasc, and the Defence Forces. Britain's changing demography has forced many colleges there to seek students abroad to fill their faculties; in key areas such as medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, physiotherapy and even agriculture, they have been busily offering places to Irish students. Many young people from the Republic have also found that the offer of a course in Northern Ireland provides the opportunity to expand educational horizons in more than one sense.