Mr. Ken Whyte:

I will be careful about what I say. One should be careful about what one looks for sometimes. As for the idea of reducing the number of subjects to something closer to the English model, we should be cautious. One of the powers of the leaving certificate model is that the intention is that students will have a broad education. Asking people very early to reduce the number of subjects they will study might have inherent dangers. The other thing is that children mature at different rates. Very often what a child is interested in and good at at 14 or 15 is not what they are interested in or any good at at 17, and asking them very early to make those choices might open up difficulties. The transition year can be explored a lot more. The potential within transition year has not been explored. We see this now in the youthreach model, for example, where they do a broader range of stuff. We see some of the benefits of that because youthreach is perhaps much closer to a transition year experience than the traditional leaving certificate. I would just put in those caveats. I am not pushing to go against the tide or anything.