From the evidence of gross inconsistencies coming in from schools and English teachers around the country, it is clear that a substantial quantity of 1997 honours English Leaving Cert marks are unreliable. The phenomenon expresses itself in two ways. The most common was what Maire Clancy of St Vincent's, Dundalk, called "role reversal" - many students who normally get A or B getting C or D and the reverse.
This was strongly supported by most schools. For example the Marist College, Athlone, and the Ursulines in Waterford observed it in at least 10 cases. Edward Moran, an English teacher from Belmullet, Co Mayo, agreed that "talk of differences in interpretation could not explain confusing an A with a C in even a single case". We are looking at possibly hundreds of cases.
The other indication of unreliability came from Garbally College, Ballinasloe, on "bunching" - instead of the expected distribution of marks there is a huge concentration in the C and D range; at Community College, Moate, Co Westmeath, a concentration of 18 Cs in an exceptionally good class of 26 was just not a believable distribution. At Scoil Chaitriona, Dublin, in three related subjects Irish, French and German, the percentage getting honours were 83, 71 and 78 respectively but only 64 in English; while there was 33, 25 and 31 per cent Bs in the other subjects there were only 18 per cent Bs in English. This herding of most papers into a "safe" C or D in English suggests that the papers are not being read carefully enough to distinguish between high, medium and low quality work. But giving A students C and D, and giving borderline honours candidates A suggests the complete abandonment of any effort to mark the papers. Over the past two weeks these phenomena have been described to us by teachers from 21 schools around the country and complaints from over 60 parents or students increase the number of relevant schools to 36, in 22 different counties.
This has been a long-standing problem - in St. Mary's Dundalk in 1995 of 80 honours students, an incredible 72 received C to D grades, including 11 who had A or B in their Junior Cert. One of 18 rechecks was upgraded. There were over 2,400 calls for rechecks last year, over 2,700 this year and hundreds more who wanted a recheck but were not granted it. Also, many who have their required points don't apply - others because they have lost confidence in the recheck process. Of the first 126 inconsistencies from '97 which I've had time to examine, half are A or B students who received Cs, Ds or Es. If this is projected across all rechecks, it would require 50 per cent to be significantly upgraded to correct the inconsistencies in the A to B categories alone.
To guarantee that on their second chance, at least, the pupils receive an assessment that is above suspicion, all the examining panel, including the senior examiners must be replaced. The new examiners must be Enlgish teachers who have taught the Leaving Cert honours syllabus for at least three of the last six years. Removal from the paper of previous marks and other requirements, have also been presented to the Minister.
The embarrassment and criticism for this has been taken by schools and honest, hard-working teachers who have had, year after year, to stand in front of bewildered, agonised parents and students, their five years of careful assessment made a mockery of. Is it any wonder we have heard in the last two weeks of English teachers leaving the teaching profession, or of boycotting honours classes?
English teachers are no longer prepared to take the blame and they are demanding the right to prove that they are not to blame. Teachers from the National Forum are not prepared to accept anything less than a fully independent recheck. Parents are not prepared to risk their children's prospects in a rechecking process that has been proven to be unreliable. al Martin. And we note the precedent Mrs O'Rourke set 15 years ago when she imposed a Ministerial judgement to correct the injustice of double honours in maths.
Teacher of English at the Marist College, Athlone.
