Little interest in science education at P.ie?

[ibis]

Is it possible to dumb down science at university level? There isn't much room for bluffing,surely. Even if science could be dumbed down,....

perhaps although it's only anecdotal but a leaving cert student several years ago told me that at pass level chemistry all you had to do on one question was identify lab equipment from a sketch. There must be grade inflation in science just like all the rest of the subjects over the past decade or so..]

At Leaving Cert level, that's probably true. I did A-level science (the Nuffield ones, so tougher than most), while my brother did LC science - the two are simply not comparable. I could certainly have passed LC science at O-level. However, that's remedied by first year Science in Irish universities, which covers the gap almost exactly - fortunately for me, since it meant I didn't have to attend any of my first-year Chemistry or Biology lectures at UCD at all, and could concentrate on getting drunk.

A BSc Hons from an Irish university, on the other hand, is a good deal tougher than the same from most (nearly all?) UK universities, although obviously there's variation from department to department. I actually did a year of BSc Biology at Kings College London, so I have a pretty good idea of the respective workloads and expectations.

So, in respect of the OP, I would expect Irish students to be well behind UK students on science up to school leaving - and the same for any other country that uses a UK-style few-subjects-in-depth approach. By graduation, however, I would expect the tables to have turned.

i don't disagree with your evaluation but the point i was making is i don't think it would have been so simple say 15 -20 years earlier.
there is a degree of 'dumbing down' taking place if this is the case.

Hmm. Well, that would take you back to the 60's...