Teachers have welcomed today's changes to the Leaving Cert exam timetable but said more needs to be done.
Gemma Tuffy of the Assocation of Secondary Teachers in Ireland (ASTI) told
ireland.comthat an extension of
the exam period will benefit students by giving them relief intervals between intense subjects.
She added: "
We want to see some of the minority subjects, that is those that are taken by a handful of students, moved into the first few days of the exams so that everyone has a bit of a break.
" The exam timetable reform was introduced in response to teachers' concerns with the high volume of essay-writing at the beginning of the exam period."
With the major subjects; geography, English, Irish and history, being scheduled in the first few days, the exams were becoming a "test of endurance" for many students, Ms Tuffy said.
Announcing the changes Minister for Education and Science, Mary Hanafin, said the "revised timetable is the most significant and student-centred reform of the exams timetable in decades".
But Ms Tuffy said more improvements were needed.
Although ASTI have said more can be done to benefit students, Ms Tuffy agreed the changes will ensure exams will now become "
less of a test of endurance and that is positive".
The new timetable will be reviewed at a later date allowing teachers, students and parents the opportunity to give feedback.
"For a long time we've been calling for change regarding the timetable," she said.
"Students were sometimes enduring six hours of handwriting in a day. That's asking a lot of them physically, and the exams end up being a test of stamina."