What 2022's Leaving Cert class have to say about life since 2020

Analysis: research into the pandemic experiences of Irish youths has identified key themes around wellbeing, mental health and the school system

By Carmen Kealy and Eamonn Furey, NUI Galway

As well as having an effect on student engagement, teaching practice and assessment, pandemic-related school closures in the last two years may have long term consequences for young people. As we move towards post pandemic life and with this year's Junior and Leaving Cert examinations on the way, a re-evaluation of Irish educational policies and practice is warranted.

A team of researchers from NUI Galway looked at how marginalised and non-marginalised young people (12 to 18 years of age) and their parents coped with life and education since 2020. Surveys and interviews were conducted to document families’ experiences and make recommendations. Some key themes emerged around wellbeing, mental health and flexibility in the delivery and assessment of the school curriculum.

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From RTÉ Radio 1's Liveline, Dr Penny Nolan is concerned at the number of Leaving Cert patients she is seeing suffering with anxiety

While some young people were described as having struggled to engage in online schooling during school closures, others adapted relatively easily. Parents found that young people who saw face-to-face schooling as challenging actually benefitted from learning differently and demonstrating learning in alternative formats, which should be encouraged, moving forward. If the online learning did remain, you know, that if it was another avenue for them rather than having to drop out of mainstream school … (parent).

Students receiving mental health supports and those in the final years of secondary school coped less well on the physical return to school. When asked what supports were necessary, the most common request was a stronger focus on wellbeing and mental health in school. 'Emotional support should be provided because mental health is more important than schoolwork. If we are struggling mentally, we are less likely to do as well in school' (5th Year student)

Parents felt that teachers and other professionals should be cognisant of the mental health impact of the pandemic on young people. 'I think definitely the counsellors in the school are very important, they play a very important role, being available for the children' (parent)

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Young people wanted positive relationships with their teachers and felt that teachers needed to be more aware of students’ stress levels. 'I think the schools should be more engaged with the individual students. None of the teachers reach out to the students to see how they are actually doing. They just assume that everyone is fine and then when u reach out for help, they give you one conversation with the guidance counsellor and then brush it off like nothing happened the next day' (6th year student)

'If teachers or counsellors talk to us in a way, we can relate and understand I feel that would make a difference. Just if they had a better understanding of how anxiety and stress can make us feel, not just how it arises and how it can be 'overcome’, overall, that would be better' (5th year student)

Alongside academic catch-up, young people wanted to see changes in the teaching and learning methods and felt that there should be less pressure around exams and assessments. 'Not just teach the same type of learning method for everyone. Because everyone learns differently you can't expect everyone to learn the same way. And pay attention all the time' (5th Year Student).

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'The last 18 months have been quite strange. When we first went into lockdown, I was in 3rd year. We had online classes every day for every subject. I liked the online classes as I have good self-motivation and was able to be ready to learn for each class. At the end of the year we did online assessments instead of our Junior Cert. These assessments suited me better as you didn’t have as much stress as you would in an exam' (3rd Year student)

Parents believe that the rapid modification of the assessment process during the pandemic showed that reform is possible, although the predictive grades system was not the ideal solution. The current system was described as stress-inducing and far too centred on examinations for the purposes of going onto higher education, with little recognition of diverse post-Leaving Certificate pathways.

'In terms of the education, a lot of the way, they could just cut away a lot of the Leaving Cert or, you know. Is it now not important, does it have to come back, do you know? Do we need to put that level of stress on our young people? Do we need to put that level of anxiety on them?' (Parent)

'You know, this is, where the schools, this is, where the colleges need to say, well, we have all these apprenticeships, you don’t need 600 points to get into college. You can do it a different way. And we’re going to work with all the employers in the area, we’re going to work with all the schools in the area' (Parent)

Student wellbeing should be seen as an essential ingredient in academic engagement and performance. In order to address the immense stress caused by current assessment structures, students’ views as well as the impact of high-stakes summative assessment on student wellbeing need to be taken into account.

The Crisis Coping-Marginalised young people's living and learning experiences during COVID-19 in Ireland project was funded by the Health Research Board and the Irish Research Council

Dr Carmen Kealy is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the UNESCO Child and Family Research Centre at NUI Galway. Dr Eamonn Furey is a researcher at the UNESCO Child and Family Centre at NUI Galway

The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ

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