Michael Lowry (Tipperary North, Independent)
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Question 813: To ask the Minister for Education and Science if, in view of prolonged delays encountered during leaving certificate re-checks which often result in a genuine student not receiving his or her first place offer, she will expedite the exam re-check procedures and timeframes for leaving certificate students; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [14478/06]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The State Examinations Commission has statutory responsibility for operational matters relating to the certificate examinations, including issuing the results of examinations and determining procedures to enable the review and appeal of results of examinations at the request of candidates. Notwithstanding this, as I informed the Deputy on 20 October 2005 in response to similar questions on this issue, I had inquiries made with the State Examinations Commission and was advised as follows.

The results of the leaving certificate which issue from the commission in August of each year are provisional only, as is clearly stated in correspondence. The objective of the State Examinations Commission is to ensure that the processing of results is as free from error as possible. The leaving certificate examinations cover 375,000 grades to 57,000 candidates involving 3,000 examiners. Recognising the inevitable problems that can arise in a system of this size, a transparent, easily accessible and effective appeals process is available to all candidates who are unhappy with their results

The appeal process involves candidates viewing their scripts to see how marking schemes were applied. In 2005, this was completed on 2 and 3 of September. The closing date for receipt of appeal applications in 2005 was 7 September. The results of the appeals, some 11,500 in all, issued on 12 October 2005, some five weeks later, during which time the physical re-marking of the appeal scripts took place. During this limited timeframe, examination scripts had to be retrieved from schools, distributed to examiners, fully re-marked by appeal examiners, monitored in at least 20% of cases by appeal advisers, and returned to the State Examinations Commission for results processing.

It is acknowledged in examination systems all over the world that some level of error may occur. It is for that reason that national examination systems must have effective appeal processes. The Irish system is a world leader in terms of giving candidates an opportunity to view their scripts before deciding whether or not to appeal. Another comparable strength of the appeal system is that a full re-marking, as distinct from a check of mark addition, takes place. On balance it is considered that it is better to have a comprehensive, quality appeal system that takes some time to execute rather than to prejudice quality by a less comprehensive, speedier process.

Offers of third level places are made by the CAO on the basis of the provisional results issued in August. There are good reasons they do this because to delay the offering of places until the appeals process is completed would impact upon the start date for the academic year and thus disadvantage the overwhelming majority of candidates whose provisional results are their final results. The State Examinations Commission makes every effort to process the results of appeals as quickly as possible in order to facilitate the college entry process balanced with the need to allow the appeal examiners sufficient time to carry out a thorough re-marking of candidates' work.