Mr. Ryan Sharpe:

In our report, we suggested there would be a fork in goals after third year so students who wanted to go off and do a trade or something like that could go to a technological school. They could go off and do a trade, an apprenticeship and a bit of college work. Students who wanted to take a more academic path, such as STEM, or anything to do with college or university would continue with the leaving certificate and then university. That would get many people doing trades and get up participation rates in trades. It would lead to many women taking up trades too because it would be so easy to access, whereas at the moment that path is very hard to access.

As Mr. Ahern has said, students need their leaving certificate and certain grades to get an apprenticeship. Some people just are not able for that and do not want to do that. They will not focus on that. It is just a bit silly restricting some people's lives just because they do not want do maths or English. They might want to fix cars or whatever. It should be at least an option.