Mr. Andrew Brownlee:

I thank Mr. Healy. I touched on some of this earlier but there are probably three fundamental aspects that I would like the committee to examine. The first is the embedding of vocational options as part of the senior cycle. As Mr. Healy mentioned, there is an opportunity now to do that. There is a system in Scotland where further education colleges deliver modules effectively as part of the leaving certificate or highers, as they are called in Scotland. There is real potential to look at a similar system to get those kind of vocational options and experiences on the table, particularly in schools that do not have the technical teaching capability to look at delivering them.

The second is around CAO reform. We need to find a way to put further education and apprenticeship options on the table at exactly the same time as higher education choices for our school leavers. That needs to be done either via the CAO system directly or a parallel system that sits alongside that. It is very important that we can reinforce that aim.

The third aspect is around the role of the transition year, TY. If we can embed taster modules and experiences as part of TY that give students a flavour for the many great apprenticeship and further education opportunities we will sow the seeds and then build on that through the other two interventions after that.