Life after the Leaving Cert

Sir — May I join your excellent columnist, Dr Ciara Kelly (Living, Sunday Independent, May 13), in giving some advice to the many parents of children who will be sitting their Leaving Cert in the next week or so? I am well into my 60s and I still have nightmares about sitting mine.

Tell your children, and often, that you love them. Tell them that you hope they will do their best but whatever the outcome they can come home and they will be loved just as much as ever.

Tell them there is lifelong learning and the Leaving Cert is but one, relatively small, stepping stone along the road of life. And always remember, the ones who do best do not always succeed best in life. I sat my Leaving Cert in 1969, and the pressure was horrific, way over the top. Of course, it did not help that school life in general at that time was a very unhappy experience. I survived and learnt very quickly there was a lot more to life than the Leaving Cert. Brian McDevitt, Glenties, Co Donegal