PEOPLE BEFORE PROFIT TD Paul Murphy is calling for a major overhaul of the current Leaving Cert exam, proposing to “get rid of the points race”. 

Murphy suggested increasing the number of places on college courses ‘even by a relatively small amount’ to allow students to get courses they want, as the government begins to phase out Covid-era grade inflation. 

It plans to reduce the inflation in Leaving Cert points from 7.5% to 5.5%.

In the longer-term, Murphy proposed students should be able to get places based on matriculation requirements – such as achieving certain grades in subjects directly required for their degree – rather than points. 

Murphy said that this move will introduce a “high degree of unfairness” to students sitting this year’s Leaving Cert as they will achieve an average of 15 or 16 points less than those who sat it last year. 

The Dublin South-West TD told The Journal that a ‘significant’ number of Leaving Cert students who sat the exams in previous years are still in contention for CAO points and university places this year, which he thinks creates an “artificial market”.

“A surprisingly high number of previous students are in the CAO mix in any given year. I saw figures around claiming that it was 25% from previous years.”

He added: “There is an advantage for the previous year’s students. So this short-term issue isn’t going to be resolved by a massive restructuring of third level education by September.”

Increase college places

In describing his plan to restructure the major state exams, Murphy stopped short of calling to reduce the points obtained by previous years’ students to achieve fairness in the interim. Instead, he proposed facilitating more university admissions to achieve greater parity between past and present Leaving Cert students.

“The answer is to increase the number of places in college, even by a relatively small amount,” he said. “It should mean that if the average points are down, let’s say by 15 points, the average points that you need to access any given course [...] will be down by 15 points.”

Murphy argued that converting part-time university staff into full-time workers could be a valid option to accommodate any increased university admissions.

“You actually can expand college places, like they did it previously during Covid. You could do it again. It’s something like 10,000 part-time academic workers in third level education, many of whom will be happy to move to a full time position.”

Open access to university

Murphy used the example of what was once the ‘Primary Cert’ that primary school pupils sat for Irish, English and Maths to evaluate their aptitude for advancement to secondary school.

That was abolished in 1967, and Murphy wants to see similar action taken at second-level which he believes will remove the meritocracy of securing a university place based on Leaving Cert success, instead replacing it with a “very, very different form” of assessment.

“You can keep the Leaving Cert and get rid of the points race and it’s just the final stage exam at the end of sixth year.”

He said that matriculation requirements – grades required in subjects pertinent to a chosen CAO course – are rendered “irrelevant” in the current system because of how a student’s overall points haul supersedes those requirements.

He is therefore calling for Government to instead introduce measures that will permit students who meet these matriculation requirements to be granted access into their chosen course.