Sir – Congratulations to every student who received their Leaving Cert results this week and managed to complete such a Herculean labour. As a post primary teacher, I welcome the long overdue reforms of the current education system. However, I am concerned that awarding an extra 25 points for passing higher level maths is unfair and exclusive.
We are trying to make education inclusive for our students. While it is a great advantage to the 96 per cent of the 13,014 who took higher level maths and were awarded the extra points this year, it acts as a disadvantage for the 32,165 students who took ordinary level and the 5,677 who took the foundation level papers. The possibility of attempting higher level maths is not a reality for a large proportion of students, leaving these students with an added hurdle to overcome in the points race. – Yours, etc,
DELIA DONOHOE,
Kimmage Road Lower,
Dublin 6W.
Sir, – The 58 per cent increase in the number of students taking maths at higher level in the Leaving Certificate, over the past two years, is to be welcomed. However, it should not be taken as an endorsement for Project Maths, as the Minister for Education seems to imply (Home News, August 15th). The 58 per cent increase is mainly due to the attractive incentive of 25 extra bonus points awarded to those students who do the higher level paper.
The Project Maths syllabus needs to be revised for it to succeed in making maths more accessible, understandable and relevant to the needs of students who will progress to third level. It is incredible that the NCCA designed the new Leaving Cert maths course and excluded vectors and matrices from the syllabus. Both topics are not particularly difficult to master, but are essential for most science and engineering students in the first weeks of their third-level courses. Their exclusion makes a mockery of the claim that Project Maths is more relevant to the needs of students pursuing third level courses in either the physical sciences or engineering.
The NCCA should be asked to justify their exclusion. – Yours, etc,
DONNCHA
Ó hÉALLAITHE,
Retired Maths Teacher
(GMIT),
Indreabhán,
Co na Gaillimhe.
Sir, – You carry a remarkably confused leading article about the impact of Project Maths on Leaving Cert results (Front page, August 14th).
The aim of Project Maths and bonus points was to encourage more students to attempt the higher level paper and, in this, they have clearly succeeded. It should come as no surprise that if students who previously opted for the ordinary level decided, in large numbers, to take the higher level course then there would be less high grades in the ordinary course and more lower grades at the higher level. From the students’ point of view what mattered most was whether they were rewarded with bonus points for taking the higher option and, by and large, they were.
The authors shy away from this obvious conclusion and instead embark on some embarrassingly ill-informed statistics. To take just one example, it is an invalid use of the data to state that “the number (stet) of students achieving an honour . . . has fallen by more than 10 per cent – from 83.3 to 72.9 per cent”. It would be correct to say that the proportion of students achieving an honour had dropped, but what would you expect if a large cohort who previously opted for the ordinary exam decided to take the higher one? – Yours, etc,
Dr KEVIN T RYAN,
Castletroy Heights,
Limerick .