My Leaving Cert: Charlie Bird It's well over three decades since I sat in a long, hot, stuffy room on a June day looking ponderously at the Leaving Cert maths paper.

Even now, after all those long years, I still have the flashbacks. I knew before I opened the exam paper that I was going to fail my Leaving, simply because I was not good at maths.

In those less enlightened days, if you failed maths you failed the Leaving. Indeed, if you failed any of the core subjects, down you went.

Thankfully, today we have a more refreshing approach to exams.

I suppose that, like the Late Late Show where there is always something for everyone in the audience, there is now a Leaving Cert to suit most students' abilities.

I'm sure I'm not the first person to have difficulties doing some of the more complex maths equations.

I can add one and one and even check my bank statements for fear that the bank might be adding up the charges to their benefit - perish the thought that they would do such a thing.

Months before I sat the Leaving Cert, my maths teacher, a Mr Kelly, called out to me one day: "Listen, Bird, if I were you I'd forget about maths and concentrate on something else. I think you'd make a good politician."

Mr Kelly was a keen observer of his students and knew their weak and strong points.

I've met my old maths teacher over the years and he laughs at me.

But I suppose that, at the time one is about to sit the exams, there is little consolation anyone can give.

Each person has to go through the torment of the examination process.

I can also recall vividly the day the results came out. For most of my classmates, it was a moment for celebration.

In huddles, they exchanged comments on what marks each had achieved for the various subjects.

Unfortunately I had nothing to celebrate - as expected, it was thumbs down for me on maths.

But my disappointment was sweetened to some extent by the fact that I'd passed the other five subjects that I sat.

The main drawback at the time was that without a Leaving Cert there was no chance of going on to third-level education.

So, for me, it was off to a factory that made women's perfume.

Not only did I miss out on going to university, but I also missed out on the excitement of student life and politics of the 1960s.

In those days, students around Dublin were easily recognisable, with Trinity or UCD scarfs draped around the necks.

I was envious of the life of those students, which appeared to involve permanent study and drinking.

On a more serious note, not having a third-level degree or some other form of further education under your belt was a drawback, particularly within RTÉ. There was an intellectual snobbery among some individuals within the station who felt that if you didn't have letters after your name, then you weren't worthy of advancement.

Again, thankfully, things have changed over the years and third-level education has opened up considerably, not only for those of us who were weak on the maths or some other subject but, more importantly, for people from social backgrounds who in the past might not have been able to avail of the opportunity to continue in further education after second level.

I was fortunate that, despite the drawback of not having a Leaving Cert, I was able to find my way into journalism and make a reasonably good career for myself. There has always been more than one way to skin a cat.

Dogged determination will nearly always pay off - effort should be rewarded.

Of course I would like to have gone through the halls of academia.

Given the opportunities there are today, most people should make the effort to continue in further education.

It is easy to say that one should not be worried about the outcome of the Leaving Cert.

However, for most of us, how we perform in this examination charts our future careers and job opportunities.

For me, 30 years or more after those long, hot June days when I already knew that the writing was on the wall for me, I ended up being the subject of a question on one of last year's Leaving Cert Irish papers.

So I came full circle - having failed my own Leaving Cert, I end up in the Leaving Cert.

Mr Kelly was right when he told me I had other abilities - most of us have when we decide to use them. There is life both with and without a Leaving Cert.