Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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One of the great levellers of Irish society has been the leaving certificate examination. No matter who one was or where one came from, when one sat the examination, one knew one’s papers would be marked objectively and fairly. In many respects, an outstanding student from Castleisland was treated the same as an outstanding student from Castleknock. Unfortunately, that has not occurred this year. Obviously, it was as a result of the pandemic that new, extraordinary measures had to be put in place. To a large extent, those efforts were successful but there is a large contingent of students who were treated very unfairly by the State in this process. These were the students whose estimated grades, provided by their teachers, were marked down by the State during the standardisation process.

The decision made about the students has had a major impact on their lives. Not only did very many of them not get the first course they were seeking but they did not even get the second, third or fourth. Had they received the marks their teacher originally gave them, they would have been able to get into the courses they had at the top of their CAO list. Unfortunately, the CAO process, which is usually very transparent, has not become transparent as a result of this.

I have spoken to so many parents and children over recent days that I could not go into the full detail with the Minister. It would take me so long. The Minister will no doubt be aware, however, that there is considerable upset over what happened to the students. They were treated unfairly. It appears to be the case that these students, who are students of schools that previously excelled in the leaving certificate examinations, were downgraded because of their schools' excellence. That is not fair. The State needs to acknowledge that the students were treated unfairly. We need to recognise this and try to determine what we can do for them.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister for attending in person. She carries a great burden at this time – the burden of office associated with looking after and ensuring the smooth running of our primary and second level education systems during these extraordinarily challenging times. The country, and certainly her party colleagues and everybody in the Dáil, are grateful for the job she is doing and the manner in which she has taken on her task.

Deputy Jim O'Callaghan has, in his usual erudite way, made most of the points I wanted to make, including the point on the leaving certificate being a great leveller. Historically, there was a suspicion that if one went to a school with a high proportion of pupils from so-called disadvantaged areas, one would be unfairly penalised in the marking of the leaving certificate examinations. To some degree, we are now looking at the other side of that coin. As Deputy O'Callaghan said, this matter needs to be treated with a sense of urgency that might not have been applied in respect of disadvantaged pupils in the past.

The predicted grading has gone enormously well, and the Minister and her Department deserve great plaudits for that, but it appears to have been unfair on some students, who appear to come disproportionately from schools that achieved excellent results in previous years. I look forward to hearing the Minister's response. I have no doubt that it will be measured, bearing in mind the context of threatened High Court proceedings, appeals, etc. We are grateful for the Minister's presence.

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputies for raising this issue and allowing me to address it.

The provision of calculated grades to students arose in the unprecedented circumstances of our not being able to run a leaving certificate examination, as the Deputies will all be aware. The concept was first mooted by students and there was an extensive process of engagement with education stakeholders and an agreement to proceed with the calculated grades process. Under the model, estimated marks from schools were adjusted, using a carefully developed standardisation model to ensure a consistent standard was applied across schools across the country, when judging the performance of students. Standardisation takes place every year in marking the leaving certificate examinations. That is an extremely important point. While teachers are familiar with their own students, they cannot be expected to have knowledge of the standards nationwide. Standardisation allows student-to-student comparability across the country.

As Deputies may be aware, at the start of September I brought to the Cabinet a proposal to remove school-by-school historical subject level data from the national standardisation process used to determine calculated grades. This decision meant that no student's calculated grade was impacted by the historical performance of the school he or she attended. The statistical procedure has been subject to a high degree of oversight by the national standardisation group which was established to oversee the work. Its implementation has also been independently overseen by an independent steering committee, chaired by Dr. Áine Lawlor, former director of the Teaching Council. All the information regarding the process and its oversight is fully transparent and it is available online at .

As Deputies will know, as part of the process, schools provided the Department with an estimated percentage mark and rank order for each student. Following the standardisation process, the estimated percentage mark was converted to a calculated mark and, subsequently, to a calculated grade. This was provided to students on 7 September. It is only at this point that students were awarded a grade.

It is not accurate to state students were downgraded, or upgraded, through the standardisation process; rather, the grade that was awarded following the standardisation process is the grade for the 2020 leaving certificate calculated grades.

The system of calculated grades allowed the Department to provide results to over 60,000 students, many of whom have now received CAO round one offers. Some 80% of CAO applicants received a CAO offer from their top three preferences. Of all grades awarded, 83.1% were either the same or higher than the grade that school estimated percentage marks would have awarded, while 16.9% were lower. The increase of 4.4 percentage points in the average marks across all subjects and at all levels this year is present across all types of schools. It was inevitable, however, that some students would have their estimated marks adjusted downwards as part of standardisation.

The overall data from school estimated marks show there was a very significant rise in estimated grades against what would normally be achieved nationally in examinations. Without standardisation in some subjects, the number of H1s awarded would have been two to three times higher. This would not have been tenable and would have presented considerable difficulties for higher and further education.

While some students had a lower percentage mark awarded following standardisation, it is possible that many of the concerns being raised are based on what marks schools estimated for their students this year rather than on the results attained in examinations across previous years. I believe this is the point made by the Deputies. The standardisation process was applied to all schools in the same way, irrespective of whether the school was in the State system or was fee charging.

With regard to schools outside the State system, data analysis in the report of the national standardisation group shows that schools in the non-recognised category, which is made up largely of institutions often referred to as "grind schools", overestimated their student marks to a greater extent than in recognised schools.

Furthermore, when comparing the results of students in fee-charging schools in the State sector and in the private non-recognised schools institutes versus those in non-fee-charging schools, those in fee-charging schools and institutions still have higher scores than students in non-fee-charging schools even after standardisation.

Students who are disappointed with one or more of their calculated grades had the opportunity to submit an appeal. The appeals process closed yesterday, Wednesday, 16 September at 5 p.m. The appeals process is a review focused on looking for errors in the transmission and processing of student data through the process.

Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister for her considered reply in respect of this matter. I note she states it is not accurate to say that schools or certain students were downgraded but that is how the students see it. Last Monday, when they got the estimated grades given to them by their teachers and learned those grades were above what they got in the official calculation grades, they viewed that as being downgraded. I recognise this is an exceptional event. One thing we can learn from this is that we need to get back to the leaving certificate as it usually operates because no matter what the unfairness of the leaving certificate may be, it is an objective and fair system of assessing academic ability.

What is going to happen in this appeal process? There is a huge amount of uncertainty as to what is involved and who will make the assessments under the appeals. Is it purely a clerical appeal or is there some further facility available to the students who put it in?

We should acknowledge the upset that has been felt by these students. A woman told me on the phone today that she was not prepared to leave the house because she was so concerned at how upset her son has been since he got his results. That is across the board and not just in certain schools or in certain counties. I have spoken to colleagues in this House and it is an issue throughout the country. We need to recognise the unfairness these students believe they have been subjected to.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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There is quite a lot to digest in the Minister's response and I am grateful for the detail into which she went in such a short period. I take on board, as everybody does, that faced with an unprecedented set of circumstances her Department moved quickly and came up with a system that has attempted, successfully for the most part, clearly, in dealing with the challenges faced by students. It is worthy of repetition and we do not want to lose sight of that.

The Minister is right to emphasise, and we all knew it as public representatives at the time, that this was student-led. As there is a movement at the moment within the present sixth years regarding how they will be treated next year, there are some lessons to be learned from here as well.

In the short time the Minister has left perhaps she could give us some details on what my colleague said about the appeals process. Given the closing time was yesterday, has she any idea yet on the nature and number of the appeals or what kind of cohort of school or schools they are coming from? That is an interesting finding with regard to the so-called non-State schools, that is, the grind schools. It is a sobering fact, and she presented it as such. It is something that parents may bear in mind as they go forward because the success of this depended completely on objectivity as much as possible. There are, however, some questions to be answered. I look forward to the Minister's second response on this and perhaps some further correspondence on it.

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I reiterate that the development of the model for calculated grades has been a challenging process and would not have been possible without the co-operation of teachers and schools. I absolutely acknowledge that.

For students who are disappointed with their results, the opportunity to avail of the appeals mechanism to ensure there were no administrative errors in processing their results was, as I have already outlined, provided to them. I appreciate that in every examination system and in every leaving certificate system, as we are aware, there are students who will be happy and students who will be disappointed. I absolutely want to acknowledge that. I also acknowledge that it has an impact on entire households in circumstances of that nature. I am aware and cognisant of that.

I also reiterate that students have opportunities at the postponed examinations in November. I believe this is an important avenue open to students should they wish to available of it.

It is important to point out that this year, the CAO was able to make 78,950 first round offers last Friday. That is 6% higher than in 2019. Overall, CAO applications were up only 0.6% as a result of additional places being made available by the Government. This means many more students will have received a CAO offer. Some 52% of students received an offer for their first preference course while 80%, as I said previously, received an offer for a top three preference. Again, given that we are in the midst of a pandemic and given the extraordinary circumstance in which we find ourselves, it is an extraordinarily positive reflection that so many students were in a position to avail of those offers.

Inevitably, there will be students and parents who remain dissatisfied with the outcome of the calculated grades and the CAO process. Every year, students miss out on CAO places as more students seek places than there are actually places available. I would, however, encourage those students to explore the options available to them to achieve their goals and ambitions and I wish them well. I recognise that it can be a difficult time for everybody involved. It was, however, an extraordinary circumstance that meant we had to introduce an extraordinary measure and that was the agreed measure of calculation grades.