Has the Leaving cert been 'dumbed down'?

[birthday]

Firstly congratulations to all students on Leaving cert results and to those teachers (yes there are many) who worked hard to help their students.

For old timers like myself I am often somewhat surprised at the number of very high grades achieved in recent years. Some say it is because students and teachers are working harder and I am sure that this is the case often enough but the suggestion that the exam has been 'dumbed down' is often made and deserves to be treated in a manner that will address whether there is some truth in this assertion.
Is it possible to objectively measure whether this is so?
I would not be tempted to take at face value anything from the Department of Education on this and was wondering is there any independent way of investigating this.

[NeilW]

Of course it is possible to objectively measure this, the papers are available for anyone to study. Whether the standard to achieve certain grades has been raised or lowered is harder to judge because you'd need to see the answers. But do you have any evidence at all to back up the "suggestion" that the exams have been dumbed down. I havent looked at a paper since I sat the exams myself years ago but back then the exams were getting harder, if anything, over the years and I doubt that trend has reversed dramatically since then.

[Sailor]

Firstly congratulations to all students on Leaving cert results and to those teachers (yes there are many) who worked hard to help their students.

For old timers like myself I am often somewhat surprised at the number of very high grades achieved in recent years. Some say it is because students and teachers are working harder and I am sure that this is the case often enough but the suggestion that the exam has been 'dumbed down' is often made and deserves to be treated in a manner that will address whether there is some truth in this assertion.
Is it possible to objectively measure whether this is so?
I would not be tempted to take at face value anything from the Department of Education on this and was wondering is there any independent way of investigating this.

I don´t honestly think it has been dumbed down - certainly the subject content and standard have been raised since I did my LC forty years ago. But, I have been wondering about this issue too - If you got a few honours - effectively 3/4 Grade C you were considered pretty bright - now it takes a clatter of A´s before anyone even notices. I suspect that teaching standards have improved , the quality of textbook is way better but at the end of the day I suspect that the key factor may be that both teachers and students may be concentrating more nowadays on how to maximise results based on teaching that is highly exam focussed. Question is are they studying a subject or are they studying how best to pass a particular exam in that subject ?

[Jock_the_Waster]

I would not know.

I did my leaving before the Inter.

[lostexpectation]

no

[Vega1447]

but the suggestion that the exam has been 'dumbed down' is often made and deserves to be treated in a manner that will address whether there is some truth in this assertion.
Is it possible to objectively measure whether this is so?

Yes.

The late Seamus Brennan when Min Ed certainly dumbed down the LC H Maths syllabus and correspondingly the LC H Maths exam.

Others may know more about other subjects but
This I Know....

[hammer]

Of course it has been.

Next year - it will be dumbed down even more to try and get as many to qualify for fee paying universities...

You actually get marks now if you know your own name.

Teachers are the problem. Dont know the difference between Paper 1 and Paper 2 !!

Tribunal......

[lostexpectation]

its not dumbing down if the lc math honours was too hard and took up too much time, which it does, its making it doable

[Vega1447]

its not dumbing down if the lc math honours was too hard and took up too much time, which it does, its making it doable

It means that:

a 1989 LC H Maths B1
is worth (much) more than
a 2009 LC H Maths A1.

Which *is* dumbing down...

[Akrasia]

The LC is one of the toughest exams in the world, much harder than any University exams I have ever done (and I have a Masters degree)
It's not just the questions on the papers, but the fact that there are so many different subjects crammed into such a short space of time, each of which requires vast stores of information to be able to achieve an A grade.