Technical issue for some vision impaired exam students

The State Examinations Commission has said that at least 10 vision impaired Leaving Certificate and Junior Cycle students were unable to access their digital papers this morning due to what it described as a technical problem.

A scheme to provide digital papers to vision impaired students was introduced for Leaving Certificate candidates on a pilot basis last year. The scheme was extended to Junior Cycle students this year following a successful High Court challenge taken by a Junior Cycle student.

Twenty-six students in total were eligible for the papers this year, which enable them to zoom in and enlarge sections to aid understanding. However, students and staff working in at least 10 schools were unable to open the papers this morning.

The State Examinations Commission (SEC) told RTÉ News that it was contacted by 10 schools who were unable to access the papers. It says it followed up with the service provider responsible for access and that the technical issues were resolved by 11.15am.

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The SEC says it is still following up on the exact number of students affected, however it says the problem did not impact all 26 eligible students.

It said measures would be put in place for any student who was negatively affected.

RTÉ News has been contacted by the parents of two students who were impacted. The parent of one Leaving Certificate student said their child, who is registered blind and is also autistic, was completely thrown by the experience.

The student was offered a modified physical paper when the school was unable to open the digital paper, but because the paper was in colour they could not access it. In the end, a reader read out the questions.

The student’s parent told RTÉ News that their child did not manage to finish the exam and was “up in a heap” as a result.

In a statement, the SEC said it understood that candidates impacted took their examinations this morning using the hard copy of the paper “with any time lost being restored at the end of the examination session”.

However, the parent of the Leaving Certificate student told RTÉ News that her child had not been offered any extra time.

The SEC said; “We will also be undertaking a further review process to ensure the affected candidates are not disadvantaged in this examination. We do apologise to the candidates impacted by this issue.”

“The delivery of digital papers in still very much in the pilot phase and the SEC will continue to monitor and review this pilot project and implement improvements where possible, while maintaining the absolute security of the examination papers”, it said.

Record number of students begin State exams

This year’s Leaving Certificate and Junior Cycle exams got under way with a record 136,160 candidates opening their exam papers this morning.

The rise is the result of demographic growth, which has led to a 3% increase in numbers sitting Junior Cycle exams.

The Leaving Certificate Applied programme continues to grow in popularity. Last year, the number of candidates sitting LCA exams was up by 20%. This year sees a further 6% increase.

A total of 62,421 student candidates have registered for the Leaving Certificate exams, among them 4,055 who are taking LCA exams, while almost 74,000 are expected to sit Junior Cycle papers.

The Leaving Certificate Applied, as its name suggests, is more skills orientated, and it has a stronger continuous assessment component.

Reacting to English Paper 1 in the Leaving Certificate, several students said they felt the exam was challenging but fair.

“I went in there with fear, but when I actually like sat down and did it, it was actually amazing. Like I’m proud of what I did,” one student said.

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Another student said: “I thought it was really good. I thought be worse than what I expected. But when I got in, I just kept on writing and I thought it was really good.”

The exams are taking place in more than 800 post-primary schools and other venues across the country.

The Leaving Certificate exams begin with English paper 1 for most candidates, while LCA students will also sit their English paper.

The Leaving Cert exams marking process has still not returned to normal since the Covid-19 pandemic.

This year again, students have been promised that overall aggregate results for the class of 2024 will be no lower on average than those of last year.

This means that once again, the State Examinations Commission will apply adjustments to marks first awarded to students through the normal marking process.

Final examination results will be made available to candidates on 23 August.

The gradual return to normal Leaving Certificate outcomes is due to begin next year.

Minister for Education Norma Foley is among those extending best wishes to all candidates sitting the exams. Saying the tests were the culmination of many challenging years of hard work, she urged students over the coming days to “give it their best”.