Plenty of smiles, but new Junior Cert must bring long-term benefit
Changes aimed at ending days of ‘rote learning’ by pupils Students celebrate better English grades under reformed tests
IT’S early days yet, but after years of controversy, students had plenty to smile about with the first set of results from the new-style Junior Cert.
The class of 2017 experienced different forms of assessment and grading in English, the first subject to undergo change as part of the reinvention of junior cycle.
Changes in other subjects are being phased in up to 2020. Business and science are next, followed by Irish, modern foreign languages and visual art.
What we saw this year was an increase in the number of students taking English at higher level, and a boost in the proportion of students at both higher and ordinary achieving a minimum 55pc mark. This was a significant outcome for both sets of students.
Presumably, encouraged by the changes in teaching, learning and assessment, more students were encouraged to take “honours”, rather than ordinary level. Having more ordinary level students stretching themselves would be expected to dampen the overall higher level results, but the opposite was the case.
Then at ordinary level, the cohort included students who may previously have taken foundation level, which has disappeared in the new regime. Similar to higher level, there was an upward shift in grades.
It is good for students and good for the country, that individuals aim high, obviously with the necessary supports, such as teachers and other school resources, that education policy-makers must provide.
Inevitably the more favourable results in the first of the revised subjects will invite charges of “dumbing down”, or “easy marking”, particularly in year one, to ensure a friction-free transition to the new system. Time will tell us more – as will international surveys, such as the OECD PISA report on comparisons in the performance of 15-year-old students.
The changes in junior cycle have been in the making for about two decades. They were driven by a widely accepted view that the junior cycle experience, including the focus on a single set of terminal exams at the end of three years, was not serving students or the country well.
Studies by the ESRI told us that for young teenagers, dealing with all the challenges of adolescence, the move up to second-level school quickly became “all about the exam”.
By second year, a lot of them were switching off, and becoming lost to education, and probably the employment market, perhaps forever. This week, another report from the OECD, told us that large numbers of early schoolleavers go on to report feelings of depression in later life, with Ireland well ahead of the international average: 26pc of female drop-outs and 21pc of male drop-outs in this country struggle with mental health when they are older.
The structure of the traditional Junior Cert exams was also seen to encourage rote learning, to facilitate the regurgitation of serried facts on exam day. It bred generations who could “learn off by heart” in the interest of picking up marks, but maybe lacked a broader understanding of the subject.
The broader assessment process – including classroom-based assessments – integrated into the changes was hard won, with one teachers union, the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI), maintaining its opposition for years and only acceding last June. Many teachers believe traditional exams, testing knowledge in formal settings, are best. But the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) and others, including the employers’ organisation, Ibec, hold the view that while students must know their ABCs and Pythagoras’ theorem, they also need to understand what they are learning and to have the skills to apply the knowledge.
We have been told the changes to teaching and learning happening at junior cycle involve less breadth and more depth, and come with a promise that, coupled with the greater focus on student well-being, which is inextricably linked to learning, the results will be positive in the long-term, and not just for English students in 2017.
By second year, a lot were switching off and becoming lost to education