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SOME 55,781 STUDENTS in Ireland – and 34 in Libya – are experiencing what many see as a traditional rite of passage today, as they receive the results of their Leaving Cert examinations.
36,762 students took the ‘traditional’ Established Leaving Certificate, while 15,827 people sat the Leaving Cert Vocational Programme and 3,358 took the Leaving Cert Applied exams.
Some subjects, naturally enough, are taken by more students than others – this year a total of 51,517 students took an English paper at either Higher or Ordinary level.
At the other end of the scale, only 12 people sat Ancient Greek – with five of them managing to get an A grade. In fact, it’s possible that some subjects had even fewer people sitting them: the State Examinations Commission only publishes figures for exams with more than 10 candidates.
We had a look through the detailed breakdown of results awarded this year to see which subjects produce the most A grades – and which have the highest failure rates.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, it’s subjects that have comparatively fewer candidates that manage to produce proportionally higher grades – with less mainstream languages like Russian, Slovakian and Dutch, which may attract native speakers, getting more top grades.
Of the 251 students who sat honours Russian, 156 – that’s 62.2 per cent – got an A1 grade, with a further 32 picking up an A2.
All in all, 188 of the students – about three-quarters – of the students who took the Higher Lever paper passed it; only one student – who got an E grade – did not pass it.
The aforementioned Ancient Greek – which was taken by only 12 students at honours level – also produced a large chunk of As, with a single A1 and four A2s among the dozen students, who enjoyed a 100-per-cent pass rate.
Latin was next, with 27 of the 130 students who took the honours paper getting an A1. With another 23 students being awarded an A2, over 38 per cent of the students taking Higher Level Latin got an A grade.
Indeed, languages dominate the charts in subjects with the most As: Slovakian (36.1 per cent), Romanian (33), Dutch (30), Hungarian (27.3), Japanese (26.4), Italian (24.5), ordinary level Russian (22.3), Latvian (21.8) and Czech (21.4) all rank among the most prolific A grades.
There’s only one interruption in this linguistic domination – that of Applied Maths, which was sat by a total of 1490 students this year.
It’s probably fair to state that a student who takes Applied Maths at Leaving Cert level is someone who already has a strong aptitude for mathematical subjects – given that it’s not usually compulsory in schools, the only students likely to take it are those who think they will do well in it.
It’s no surprise, then, that Applied Maths is up there with the languages in terms of the number of As awarded. 27.9 per cent of the 1,344 students who took the honours paper managed an A, including 18.5 per cent getting an A1.
For the 146 students who studied the subject but later opted for the ordinary level paper, the results were even better: 37.7 per cent of those students got an A, including 28.8 per cent (that’s 42 of them) scooping an A1.
Of the 43 subjects which were taken by more than 10 students, only four had perfect pass rates: Ancient Greek, Slovakian, Bulgarian and ordinary level Russian were passed by 100 per cent of the students who sat them.
The ignominious honour of the highest failure rate went to the fringe subject of Czech, which seems to turn the logic of ‘only native speakers study this’ on its head.
A mere 14 students took the paper, all of them at honours level – but five of those students did not pass the paper, translating into a failure rate of 35.6 per cent.
Similarly counter-intuitive failure rates were seen in Portuguese (18 of the 63 candidates failed), Dutch (4 of the 20) and ordinary level Japanese (6 of the 46).
Classical Studies – which studies the ancient civilizations of Greece and Rome, and how they influenced the modern world – also had a highfailure rate.
Of the 690 students who took the paper, 68 students opted for the ordinary level – of whom 24 were given E, F or ‘No Grade’ marks. That’s a proportional failure rate of 35.3 per cent. (By comparison, a mere 5.6 per cent of people failed the honours paper.)
The joint subject of Physics and Chemistry also features highly – somewhat surprisingly, as it is another subject usually taken by students who have an aptitude for those sciences. 27 of the 96 students who sat the ordinary level paper in that subject didn’t pass it.
In absolute terms, the subject with the highest failure rate was ordinary level Mathematics. 9.5 per cent of the 33,916 students who took that course got an E, an F or ‘No Grade’ – approximately 3,200 students. Of the 11,131 who sat the higher-level paper, 2.3 per cent – or roughly just over 250 – got similar grades.
Biology also had a high level of failures, with around 9.7 per cent of the 30,536 students who took it – just under 3,000 – failing the exam at either ordinary or higher level.
English – which is not officially a compulsory subject nationally, but which is considered obligatory by most secondary schools – had a failure rate of about 2.5 per cent, with roughly 1,270 of the 50,517 students failing it.
Ordinary level Irish was failed by around 980 students of the 22,875 who sat it; at higher level, about 110 (0.7 per cent) of the 15,937 students did not score the minimum 40 per cent needed to pass.
Nearly 840 students failed higher-level French, while just over 800 failed the higher-level Business paper.
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Kenny is definitely an EU follower, does whatever the EU people tell him to do, in the best interests of the EU, to the detriment of the Irish people. I’d say he wouldn’t know what to do if he was an actual active leader and had to make the important decisions himself. He’s a “do what they tell me and keep up the fake appearances” leader.
@Adrian: How can my lovely horse Enda sign anything on our behalf without a referendum by us???
@Alois Irlmaier: us doesn’t come into it. When it came to any decision with banks bond holders and transferring the debt to the public we got zero say.
Ends and FG don’t care about Irish people its only what Merkel wants that matters.
EU is a poisoned chalice that we are addicted to. If the EU was in the interest of all member states then they would want in and not need to be locked in.
@tom: All lies are covered under the Maastricht or Lisbon treaties I believe but the Maastricht states banks can’t be bailed out whoops???
@tom: “John Perkins, Former Advisor IMF.
“My job was to identify countries with resources that corporations covert, like oil and then arrange a huge loan to that country from the World Bank or from one of its sister organisations. The money however would not go to the country, it would go to our own corporations who would make huge profits, but the majority of the people would suffer terrible as a result, because money would be diverted from Education, Healthcare and other Social Services to pay interest on the debt.”
What happened when the IMF moved in and the debt couldn’t be repaid?
“We go back into that country and say, since you can’t pay your debt, sell your resource oil or whatever real cheap to our corporations without any environmental restrictions or, or social regulations. Privatise, sell your electric utilities, your water, sewage systems, your schools, your jails, all your public sector businesses to our corporations, and in the few cases where we failed economic hitman, the jackals went in and still do and aah, they either assassinate the leaders of the country or overthrow them in coups.”
United States of Banks?
I’m all for Europe, and the European Union, but let’s do it by celebrating our diversity as well. There is no need or want by any majority of the populace to have each countries uniqueness, sovereignty, and culture subsumed into one monolithic European system. The more power seems to ebb towards Brussels, the more backlash there will be.
@The Throwaway: we have to leave this organisation before it starts collapsing around us.
@The Throwaway: agreed. They should ask the citizens of Europe how they see the future of the EU before group thinking the whole project over a federalist cliff most don’t want
@The Throwaway: So you want a POLITICAL UNION then as that is what is promised? The end of democracy and the banks will take over from governments?
https://www.rt.com/shows/sophieco/320457-eu-currency-economy-crises/
I’m all for the “European Economic Community” but not in favour of a European union.
@Kerry Blake: The WTO forced this single market behemoth in order for banks to take control, if there was no WTO then there would be a global single market them without conditions or trading blocks?
30 scandals and crises since Fine Gael came to power. The next one up, the Garda veil of silence on lying about tests and checkpoints – and sick Fianna Fail continues to prop them up. Sheer madness.
Aaa.. but everything will be ok. Fine Gael will no doubt announce another tribunal or inquiry – then give more of our rights and personal data to more Eu private companies. Go Enda!
@Unitedpeople: Fine Gael are best of a bad lot. The rest are populists caving in to any and all demands fron the Public Sector Unions.
@Unitedpeople: What other option?
They are trying to impose a united states of europe, that should be resisted. But the weasel Kenny and his like in FF, Labour will go along with it. Less control over our country rather than more is for the better.
Federalists still wield considerable influence in EU politics, but it is waning. It already was before the Brexit vote, and even more so afterwards. That’s one of the few good things about the outcome of the referendum in my opinion.
How about taking a step back and just getting on with cooperating like a normal treaty organization. I feel things started heading in the wrong direction for people, whether merely perceptually or factually, when the EU began to advertise itself as the greatest thing in the world.
@Mick Tobin: looking more like the Mafia every day.
Any chance of giving Enda that cushy EU job now as reward for his Merkel adulation? Please please you can have him, he is past his sell by date in Ireland years ago.
@Gus Sheridan: His new job is to warm Hogans bed lol.
These clowns can sign whatever they like the EU is dying fast. Nothing is happening in it and with America getting tough and the rest of the world having real growth the EU will fall apart as other countries see that Britain did the right thing.
Multi speed EU should be enough for the people to rise up and bring the EU down.
@@mdmak33: It won’t see past another 10 years because it is corrupt and rootten to the core and will eventually die. I would give it just under 10 years more?
EU unity ? Yes, unity of “over regulation” and costly over paid arrogant commissioners on the EU gravy train while we foot the unnecessary bill. Enda loves that stuff and intends boarding the gravy train. He is an EU yes-man. The British are right. Time to derail the lot !
The EU needs to focus more on economic matters. Deepen the single market and put in place structures to make the euro work better (limiting countries ability to borrow to pay public sector wages and pensions would be a very good idea).
If it just stays on that focus it will be fine. It needs to forget about further political, fiscal or military union and instead simply allow co-operation in those areas.
The threats to Western Christian/neeChristian civilisation from Eastern belligerents remain though they have changed. Europe is militarily with a Britain that sees things as they really are heading.
The Eu can be great but it very pro big business and makeing a few rich. While we pay the price.
They need to call it what it is Brussels is the head of power, stop the illusion that we vote for a government, that our taxes is not for our country but for Europe, that movement of people and goods is for all. Things like vrt are scrapped they pay a find, we bring a few bottles back we get locked up.
That our culture is been slowly eroded and customs we were us use is been changed to form a new culture and customs of one European people.
That our governments make us is changed there more manager’s to head of Europe that people in control of our country.
That eventually we be one county Europe, our country will no longer be a country but a county or state within Europe.
That we the people of now and probably our children will have to sacrifice the most and deal with the headache for us to become one European country.
So the people of the future will know as Ireland, France, Spain, Germany etc… as former countries of the eu which then be known as either United States of Europe, the European state, the European federation, and Federal Europe.
We should ask do we want this, and if have doubts use the brixt to address theses.
For the rich and elite only
Disgraceful EU
Unelected con men
@Jonathan Yeo: Which EU member wasn’t elected?
Enda did you get my permission to sign anything
@Anastasia: he didnt get mine , thats for sure.
Enda busy brown nosing again. For the record Enda not everyone in this country is pro E like you & its the people of this country that will decide whether we remain or go
He does not represent the whole of Ireland in fact he lost the election
He is only in by a dodgy deal with FF
Some of us do not want to be in the corrupt EU which is for the rich and elite only!
Do any of you remember what Ireland was like before we joined the EU? massive unemployment, and as a teenager in the 70′s in Dublin, there was nothing to do, it was bleak and depressing. The Catholic Church ruled every aspect of our lives. I could go on but I believe being part of the EU has liberated us both in thought and actions and is a force for good, albeit imperfect.
@Laura Clarke: Thanks Laura. My sentiments exactly. Ireland is too small to go it alone.
@Simon Peters: Iceland seems to be doing ok?
@Laura Clarke: while I agree that Ireland has come a long way in both attitudes and that the grip of the Catholic Church on every aspect of Irish life has been broken, most of this has more to do with the fact that the light was shone on years of institutionall child abuse and that fact that the church was more concerned with itself and it’s position than the victims of its members.
The main problem with the EU is that while the initial idea of the common market, trade, peace and cooperation was sound and a worthwhile exercise, the incremental evolution of that into the EU by way of various amendments, some of which we had no say in, and others which went to referendum in which we were told we either had no other option but to support or the sky would fall, or we got asked the same question again in another referendum, when we apparently got the answer wrong because we were too dumb to understand the question.
Now everyone that questions the EU is immediately classified as a right wing nut job and or an idiot, when that is simply not the case.
The level to which the EU has increased its power and removed sovereignty and control from member nations with little or no protest, is frankly frightening and I dread to think what it will become and how nember nations will lose not only their identities, but any illusion of control in another 20 years, nevermind another 60 years.
The English still can’t come to terms with their lack of exceptionalism.
An Y would she be there , ?????
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