As students prepare to get their Leaving Cert results this morning, parents need to handle the situation with kid gloves, writes Edel Morgan
ALL EYES ARE on the students getting their Leaving Cert exam results today, but spare a thought for the parents who have been through the emotional wringer all week, wondering how best to handle the day.
For parents it can be like tiptoeing through a minefield. Is it best to stay in the background and be quietly supportive? Or to hover around them, constantly checking for signs of mental distress? When they get their results, is it appropriate to crow from the rooftops about your grade A genius? Or to show your disappointment and immediately contact the 1800 FAIL helpline for advice on what to do because they haven’t made the grade? Say the wrong thing and you risk making things worse for an overanxious or disappointed teenager. Play it too cool and it can be misconstrued as a lack of interest.
And if that wasn’t complicated enough, there are the feelings of your child’s classmates and their parents to consider. A colleague whose youngest daughter did far better than expected in the Leaving Cert a few years ago says her first reaction was to tell anyone who would listen about her amazingly clever child. She soon realised there’s an etiquette when talking to the parents of children who may have fared less well. Instead of causing upset or offence by bluntly asking, “What did they get?”, she phrased it in a more diplomatic, “Did they get what they wanted?”, or, “Are they happy with what they got?”
Another parent, whose son is getting his results today, says if he doesn’t do well she won’t patronise him with comforting platitudes, and will say: “What a shame you didn’t get the results you want, we all know you’re a bright lad.” She believes he could be in for a shock when some of his friends, who swore they didn’t study, do surprisingly well.
How a parent reacts can depend on the personality of the child and how hard they worked. A harsh word to a child who studied but didn’t get the results can be a cruel blow.
Parenting mentor Sheila O’Malley, of practicalparenting.ie, says because the results are handed out at the school in such a public arena, it’s advisable that parents handle the situation with care. “I went with my daughter last year and you see kids who are deliriously happy, crushed and surprised. I can understand why some of them don’t want to open their results because, as long as they are sealed, there’s a protection. The results are nothing more than the measure of a set of questions but the points system is so harsh, people can interpret their result as a measure of themselves.”
Results can be accessed online, but most opt for the ritual of going to the school with their friends. O’Malley says you should be guided by your child over whether to accompany them to the school to get the results. “Some don’t want their parents there. I went because my daughter assumed I’d be going. If you do go, you then need to give them a bit of space and let them be with their friends.”
If the news is bad, she says, you need to give them time. “There’s no point rushing in to try and fix the situation. After a while you can acknowledge their disappointment and how they feel. If they didn’t do well it could be because they weren’t mature enough, emotionally ready or motivated enough to take the exam. When a child experiences failure, it can lead to a loss of confidence, but you can say to them ‘we trust in you, believe in you, we know that once you apply yourself you can achieve’.”
Not that there’s too much time to dwell on disappointment. “Eventually, you have to tell them they need to move on. If a child wants to repeat, the parent needs to act fast and put their name down in one of the colleges in record time. In my experience a lot of parents are on the ball, talking to each other and the school and looking at all the options.”
Parental worries don’t end at the Leaving Cert. “For those who go on to college, it can be a big transition from the protected environment of the school to a university with lots of people and huge lecture halls,” says O’Malley.
If you are one of the lucky parents whose child is pleased with their results, it’s also important not to overdo the praise. “You can acknowledge their effort and tell them they deserve it and say well done but, ultimately, they aren’t defined by an exam result. To go over the top could push them into perfectionism.”
Perspective is also a good thing. The over-emphasis on the importance of this exam can leave many people comparing the points they got in the Leaving Cert with other students even when they’re in third-level education. Others are left with recurring exam dreams for decades afterwards.
“The comfort is that there’s a lot of choice, and if you can’t get in the front door of the career you want, you can always get in the back door.”
The Irish Times Results Advice Line is 1800 946942
