Lack of Leaving Cert Applied offers
Sir — Your Business section last Sunday featured an article by Gavin McLoughlin which, quoting Michael Moriarty, general secretary of Education and Training Boards Ireland (ETB), claimed that some parents are college-favouring “snobs” and urged more of them to send their children into traineeships or apprenticeship programmes.
The reality in Leitrim is different. In all of Co Leitrim there is not one of the seven second-level schools which provides a Leaving Cert Applied (LCA) course. In a general sense, the LCA is for those who are clever in a technical and vocational way, but not able for the more academic Leaving Cert. The LCA should provide a clear path into traineeships and apprenticeships.
The local Mayo/Sligo/Leitrim ETB, as inheritor, has failed to carry through the great work of the old vocational/technical schools. The whole ETB and the Department of Education has caved in to the elitism of preparing students for college courses and abandoned their original raison d’etre.
The ETB hides behind the schools, stating that they may or may not provide LCA. The ETB and the department, one would reasonably expect, should be monitoring the balance of provision and the department must provide adequate funding to encourage the active provision of LCA by more schools.
Instead, Leitrim students are expected to do with the “one size fits all” Leaving Cert, with no variety or adequacy. If a student fails the usual Leaving Cert, that young person is in danger of falling through the cracks. All students should have easy access to psychological assessment. Here, the department is found badly wanting and negligent. Career guidance teachers, who could guide students into the most suitable career paths, have been put ex-quota and are now an endangered species.
Parents here in Leitrim are demanding LCA as a pathway towards apprenticeships, leading into future trades and skills. They are urging the ETBs and the department to address our reality. Cllr Des Guckian, Dromod, Co Leitrim