More than 2,500 Junior Certificate examination papers were corrected by six third-level students this year because of a shortage of teachers to do the marking, the Department of Education has confirmed.
The Department used the students to mark papers in Home Economics and Civic, Social and Political Education (CSPE). It said they were graduands, final-year students due to receive degrees in September. They were paid between £800 and £1,000.
The students are understood to have examined up to 450 papers each in Home Economics or CSPE. This has been the first year the Department has been forced to advertise for examiners in third-level colleges after a shortage of teachers emerged. Students were not used to mark Leaving Certificate papers.
The Department said the students marked the papers to the highest standards and, like all examiners, their work was monitored by a supervisor, normally an experienced examiner.
While the number of students used this year was small (about 3,600 examiners were used at Junior and Leaving Certificate level), it is likely the Department will have to call on students again because of a shortage of teachers.
One reason for this, Department sources said, is that up to 30 per cent of the teaching pool get paid to supervise exams and so are not interested in marking papers.
Language teachers also have the chance to act as examiners in the oral section of the exams, and some of them do not subsequently make themselves available to the Department.
However, the teacher unions claim the rates for marking scripts are too low, and until they improve shortages will continue.
A spokesman for the Department's exam branch said it had no choice but to use the students because it had a duty to deliver exam results.
He said the shortages were a complicated and multifaceted problem, involving more than just the pay rates.
The president of the Teachers' Union of Ireland (TUI), Mr John McGabhann, said the use of students devalued the exam process as teachers were specially trained to mark papers and using "anyone appearing off the street" undermined this.
The Leaving Certificate results will be released on Wednesday, and the Junior Certificate on September 13th. For the first time, Leaving Certificate students can obtain their results by dialling 1530 719 808, or 353 1 2144 303 if abroad.
To hear their results they have to key in their examination number and a PIN number which has been distributed to schools. Calls, which are estimated to take an average of two minutes each, will cost 26p per minute, the Minister for Education, Dr Woods, said.
The service will operate from noon on Wednesday and will continue until Friday, August 18th. The results will also be distributed to schools as normal on Wednesday.
Emmet Oliver can be contacted at eolive@irish-times.ie