Billy Ryle: The Leaving Results Could And Should Still Be Delivered By Mid-August

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Guidance counsellor, Billy Ryle, says the decision to delay the Leaving Cert results until September 7 must be revisited as a matter of urgency…

The decision not to publish the Leaving Cert results until 7th September adds the final insult to the many injuries already inflicted on 61,000 young people by the Department of Education.

Leaving Cert students have been put through the mill emotionally and mentally since last March.

They have suffered the distress of uncertainty and indecision. They have ploughed a lonely furrow in a bubble of virtual reality. They had no closure as they complete their second level education. They have endured more turmoil than any Leaving Cert Class that went before.

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They are innocent victims of mindboggling bureaucracy and staggering procrastination by the Dept of Education.

They have registered for calculated grades as they were required to do. Now they are informed that they must register on a portal at www.gov.ie  from next Monday, 20th July to confirm that they want to receive their results.

Of course, they want their results. More than that, they want and are entitled to their results in mid-August. Prolonging their suffering for an extra three weeks is indefensible and unjustifiable.

The State Examinations Commission (SEC) has long since washed its hands of the calculated grades process and will have no role in the issuing of results.

A ‘Special Unit’ in the Dept of Education was drafted in by the former Minister to do the job. It received total cooperation from the students, the teachers and the school authorities.

The individual schools returned the percentages and rankings to the Dept. of Education in good time.

All the civil servants have to do is to standardise the markings to conform with previous years’ results. It’s not a task which has to be done manually. They haven’t a single examination script to check.

All the raw data is at their disposal. The Department of Education has state of the art information technology to do the number crunching.

The former Minister was firm in his conviction that the Leaving Certificate results would be issued as close as possible to the standard date, around 15th August.

That must still happen. The new Minister needs to lay out her stall by calling in the ‘Special Unit’ and metaphorically banging her fist on the desk.

The members of the ‘Special Unit’ are there to wear the green jersey on behalf of the young people who are anxiously awaiting results.

They are some of the best paid officials in the entire Public Service. Annual leave for those involved in preparing the results for publication must be deferred to a later stage.

Overtime and six-day week working must be the order of the day. Extra bodies must be assigned to this process so that the results are issued promptly.

With a bit of urgency and goodwill on the part of the ‘Special Unit’ and a bit of arm twisting by the Minister the results can still be issued in mid-August.

By delaying the results to 7th September, many students will not be in a position to draw down a SUSI college grant until well into the academic year.

A great deal of money will have been lost for accommodation that will remain unoccupied for many weeks. The CAO offers will run very late, especially for students awaiting the second and subsequent rounds of offers.

Remember that the calculated grade cannot be appealed this year, only the paper trail which led to the awarded grade. Unless students get there results on schedule, they could easily find themselves out in the cold in terms of alternative course or training options outside the CAO.

The onus is now on the Minister to have the results published in mid-August. That will allow students the time and space to consider their options calmly without having to make hurried decisions at the eleventh hour on the 7th September.

If the Minister wants my advice, which she probably doesn’t, she will call in the ‘Special Unit’ bright and early on Monday morning and tell them to pull their collective socks up as the Boss wants the calculated grades on her desk by mid-August.

• Billy Ryle is a Career Guidance Counsellor and Educational Commentator

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