Ms Andrea Feeney:

There are two issues. The end product is that we mark the examinations, provide results to the students and perhaps some information in respect of the performance of students in the examination. On the day, they had a particular feeling about an experience, and the teachers did as well, but ultimately we issued a set of results. We can see across the board that the results that students attained in Irish were on a par with English and in some of the grades better than in English. They were similar to the other junior cycle subjects. We are happy to provide that detail to the committee if it would be helpful to understand the range of performance of students.

The review I mentioned is in the context of the NCCA review and the early enactment review under the reform of the junior cycle. I read the submissions, as did Ms Sheridan, and there are many issues intertwined, not just in respect of the examination. Our boundaries are limited by what is in the specification. We cannot deviate from that. There is a particular language used within the specification about asking students to demonstrate linguistic abilities in language and literary tasks demanding personal interactive communication. We are assured that the papers we provided, both the sample and live paper, are in line with the specification, which we said already in the opening statement, and that they appropriately tested the range of abilities of students. Again, in an examination, there are varying ranges of abilities and we are asking questions and anticipating answers across a range of abilities at both the higher and the ordinary level. The review that is there is in the context of the NCCA’s early enactment review of Irish. There has been feedback within that process, as I understand, in respect of the oral competency but also in respect of the learning outcomes and of the examination itself. It is in that space but it is not our review, it is the NCCA’s review.