One student's view of the exams.
Name:Thomas McDonagh
From:Galway
Age:17
The Junior Cert was a bit of a joke to be honest. There's no real reason for it other than to have a State exam before the Leaving Cert.
I'd say I did about a week's worth of study and I probably didn't do as well as I should have.
When that was over with and we started the Leaving Cert course, most of the teachers tried to get us to work from the start and a handful of the lads in my year did. Most of us were more interested in socialising though. You see, I wasn't really any different from most of the lads in my class. I saw all of them not doing anything and I thought it was okay.
I think if I had my proper choice of subjects it would have made a difference to my level of motivation over fifth year. I felt kind of forced to take English and French at higher level. If I didn't have them I would have been much more inclined to work from the start.
"My parents weren't too worried. I'm the youngest of five sons, so they just took it in their stride. In sixth year people began to knuckle down and that gave me the motivation to get down to it. The quicker you got into the Leaving Cert frame of mind, the quicker you got into the study end of things. I didn't really get down to it until after Christmas. I put actuarial and financial mathematics in DCU down as my first choice so that gave me something to aim for. I really wanted to go to college in Dublin.
"After not doing much, it was really hard to knuckle down. I just had to take it week by week. Once I did it though, I was pretty motivated. The difference between an A1 and an A2 is 10 points so that kept me focused.
If I were to do the whole thing again, the one thing I'd change is that I'd go to after-school study in fifth year. I regretted not doing that because at the very least I would have kept up with my homework.
I actually ended up missing out on my first choice by 10 points so now I'm studying financial maths and economics in NUIG. I'm disappointed not to be in Dublin, but this is okay for now."
