So here it is, another evening spent on the computer. Working away, tirelessly procrastinating the leaving cert, and planning my plot to take over the world, as such…
Okay, let me introduce myself properly.. I’m Paul, as you may have gathered. At this stage I’m planning on doing a BEng Electronic engineering in letterkenny. Forecasted points for that is something like 270 points, so achieving a certain amount of points in my leaving cert is the least of my concern. I see the leaving cert as an exercise, the education system constantly trys to funnel my way of thoughts into its fine line, and any deviation creates a lot of friction, we Physics students are taught that friction will create heat, us computer geeks know that heat is bad for your computer.
The underlying theme that I’m trying to get across here is, well, what is the leaving cert? I study and study (well, theoretically, I don’t, but some do) and I work and work towards this final exam, a climax, this is what your 5 years of secondary school has led to, this is what your life is about. and then BOOM, the intense vacuum created by the transient paradox of what turned out to be one of the biggest Anti-Climaxes of your life evacuates all knowledge and creates a void, a void left to be filled by third level education.
Let the arguments begin. The leaving cert is just to give you a foundation knowledge, a generalized view of everything, third level then takes one particular subject, and expands on it, expands on the “general knowledge” gained from secondary school. STOP! you’re wrong, I simply cannot accept this as fact. Let me give an example; I recently started a little project in my spare time – to build a Quadcopter, without going into much detail a quadcopter is simply a square with a rotor blade at each corner. To keep the device stable in flight requires the input of data from accelerometers and gyroscopes, and to make this data usable requires a mathematical algorithm called “Kalman Filtering”. Now, I’m no math wizard, but I know my way round a bit of programming, so in theory I should be able to pick up an algorithm relatively easy. I started reading papers on it and wiki pages and whatnot, it started to talk about derivatives. That’s right, its on the leaving cert course. So I read into the derivative heavy part and what did I find out? THE EDUCATION SYSTEM HASN’T THAUGHT ME A THING ABOUT DIFFERENTIATION.
Hmm, but what happened to the 2 weeks in which we were covering that section.. oh, OK, I was taught how to answer a very specifically worded problem, I was given lots of word associations and other USELESS RUBBISH in order to answer one dumb question on some exam I wont care about in 12 months.. That’s two weeks of my life wasted, 6+ hours of math class gone, and no life skills to show for it. in fact, I could have spent those 6 hours teaching myself, and given myself a really good understanding of the concept. But no, I sat in a room, had my mind channelled into this way of thinking about one exam, held at gunpoint and told to answer the sums this way. What – I ask, is the point in that, I’m not going to ever do any of those specifically worded problems presented to us on the leaving cert in my life, no matter how complex my algorithms get.
So I guess what I’m trying to say, is that in my opinion, the education system has its elbow where its arse should be, and doesn’t know which way is up.
This post was to be about me so lets get back on that train of thought, I work as a freelance photographer, doing work for the local papers and sometimes the national press. On busy days I’ll make more than any of the teachers preaching from someone else’s knowledge in front of me. It infuriates me when teachers degrade me, act condescendingly, immature or teach a subject they have no overall understanding of. How can you expect a student to mature when they are treated like thirteen year olds from 1st year to 6th, treating a 17 year old like a 12 year old causes them to rebel, to prove they are mature! It’s one of the fundamental psychological concepts teachers seem to have a hard time grasping.
Yes, its true, I hate school, but not for no reason, I don’t hate school because “I’d rather be in bed” or “shur none of this is of any use to me“; I hate school for its narrow-mindedness – its failure to see the wider world, the wider view of a subject; I hate it for the stint in peoples personal development that condescending staff behaviour poses on students, I hate the concept, the method and how there is no way to fight it.
The leaving cert is going to be an interesting journey, latest forecasts put my points at around the 440 mark, we’ll see how that works out. frankly, I would settle for a nice meal.
I hope you’ll enjoy my posts, its a great outlet for my frustration that has built – apparently teachers don’t like this kind of thinking. Oh well. Until next time, WATCH OUT!!
Discuss the leaving cert in the forum
The education system, like many other things, is not perfect – but it is better than nothing.
of course its better than nothing. But it has so much potential.. and its not being utilised to the full of its ability
Interestingly enough, differentiation is one of the things the leaving cert explains REASONABLY well. There’s background stuff to the definition of a limit which is basically grotesque to consider, and which nobody really needs unless they are (like me) studying maths in college. The fact that, unlike the A-Levels, the LC is reasonably broad means they have to make sacrifices somewhere. I would not point the finger of blame at the curriculum itself, but rather the emphasis of the teaching. Unless you are lucky, it’s rarely “let’s sit down and consider this concept and feel our way around it”, it’s “the way to solve this problem is following these steps.” It’s a crying shame, but I’m sure people would be giving out too, if they were denied 5 more points in the leaving cert because they spent a week trying to prove the quadratic formula, instead of doing yet more exercises in long division.
You more or less backed up my point… Why should i sacrifice proving a quadratic formula for 5 extra points? Because that’s the way the leaving cert works… working to this one exam that means nothing to me.. i don’t care how many points i get. I would rather a good knowledge of certain subjects than points… what use are points to me?
Sure, you’ll say “to get into college”. but look at it from an outsides point of view…: “you guys are sacrificing knowledge for… for what? points? a score? your “intelligence” summed up in a 3 digit number..”
Paul I can see where you’re coming from. But the leaving cert is more or less an aptitude test for life. From a recent statistic done, showing the average level of IQ of the people in specific professions its quite evident.
So if you look at it in that way, the leaving cert is like a filter for tweening out those capable of doing specific things.
Having said that, the leaving cert is still very flawed and I think needs some serious refinement.
You do make a pretty valid point.
The Leaving Cert syllabuses (syllabi?) present a mere narrow overview of a subject and the people who get high points are the ones who managed to perfect that particular narrow strip.
I mean, let’s face it, I got an A1 in Geography last year, but I only found out where exactly Dubai is yesterday… I know about 8 states in the USA (We only needed to know 5…). Also, I don’t know where EXACTLY Leitrim is! (If it even does exist).
Saying that, what Kevin said is true as well- it is a bit of an “aptitude test for life”… Kind of.
I learned everything for the leaving cert from notes, never learning the background to anything. It’s a strategy.
Just a little note on what Kevin said about the leaving cert being an aptitude test for deciding who is capable of doing certain things. I can not see how the leaving cert has any bearing on a persons IQ, or even how IQ might reflect someones talents. According to your definition someone who got say 550 points would have a high IQ and should therefore enter a course which reflects their points such as pharmacy or physiotherapy. Does that mean they would not have the right to do a course with lower points such as arts or nursing, if that is where their passions lie? And is their IQ lower as a result because they have entered a different profession? Also, being able to learn off definitions and reems of useful paragraphs for essays, and therefore recieving high points in the leaving cert does not mean one is neccesarily apt for being a doctor or a physio, these require being able to put your knowledge into practice aswell as a high level of good judgement, not something that someone who just has a good memory for learning off quotes might be able to do. That’s why they’ve lowered the points and introduced the new assessment tests for medicine.
I never stated one would not have the right to enter a lower level course. I’m simply talking statistics. Of course you could get someone who gets 500+ points and decides to do a course that requires much less. But that is quite rare.
The majority of people will usually go into a course that somewhat reflects their results.
“And is their IQ lower as a result because they have entered a different profession?” I’m not sure if you’re asking yourself that question or if you’re asking me because you figure I implied it to begin with. No I don’t, that would be rather ridiculous.
Of course someone can learn off reams of essays and easily recieve a high score due to playing the memory game. That is why I mentioned it was flawed and could use some refinement.
Nobody seems to realise that memory is a form of intelligence!
You need to have intelligence to utilise the memory you already have!
I wouldn’t go as far as to say its a form of intelligence. Everyone has memory, long term and short term. And we’re constantly soaking up information. In order for us to learn we need to do so efficiently. Everyone learns best through their own medium, i.e picutres, video, audio, reading, writing. Using these methods and tools ‘intelligently’ is the key to learning essentially.
you’re a smelly, boring poo
That’s exactly how I viewed school and the leaving cert, their condescending nature and lack of knowledge drove me crazy. So I avoided school and let my grades fall from steaight A’s to Cs and Ds, to spite them, although that didnt help much as you’re meant to ”conform to beat the system” but I couldn’t abide by their mindless rules and excessive regulation one more day. So here I am, repeating in a mixed school, wearing my clothes, I go to classes if I want, I do my homework if I want, I’m treated like an adult, it’s all up to me, no pressure or pushy rules or teachers who have never had a social life and think rules are fun. And I’m having the best year of my life. I never thought I would say it.. but I love school. I do things of my own accord, not because it’s expected of me, I almost have all my mock papers back and I’m already 50 points ahead of how I did in the leaving cert last year. I think I’m proving a point. We are not all the same, we should not all be treated the same, we are not numbers. Laisse faire!!!!
that and an aptitude test is completely different to an i.q test people!!
Paul i would like a meal 2!!lets!!:)
and Jennie i’ll post you a map highlighting the precise location of lovely Leitrim!:P