A number of developments at senior cycle are now undergoing public consultation. Meanwhile, a major public dialogue has been luanched on transition from second level to third level education.
 

New Developments at Senior Cycle
A number of developments at senior cycle are now undergoing public consultation. These include:

• New syllabuses and revised assessment approaches for science subjects – Biology, Chemistry and Physics.
   
• A framework and syllabus Physical Education which will become an optional examination subject in the future.
   
• Short Courses in Enterprise and Psychology which are about half the volume of current leaving certificate subjects. The intention is that these will become available as optional, examinable areas of study in the future.

See the relevant material at www.ncca.ie/consultation

Public consultation will run to the end of October 2011. Implementation will have significant implications for students, teachers and schools in general so it is important that as many people as possible provide feedback to the NCCA.

TUI will be preparing considered responses to each of these developments under a number of inter-related themes:

• Educational value
• Resource implications (facilities, teacher numbers, school capacity)
• Equity issues (access, availability etc)
• Teacher qualifications (specifically for short courses)
• Workload for teachers and students (especially with reference to syllabus length/depth, assessment approaches, investigative work)
• Administrative issues.

Branches and members are invited to inform these responses by forwarding your views to TUI Head Office by the 15th October by post or email (showard@tui.ie).

 

Transition from Second Level to Third Level Education – a major public dialogue is launched (September 2011)

The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) and the Higher Education Authority (HEA) are co-hosting a major conference on the transition from second to third level education on 21st September 2011. Dr. Áine Hyland (former UCC) has prepared a background paper that considers a number of pertinent issues that underpin transition to, and participation in, third level education. These include:

• the points system and its impact on selection for third level colleges or courses colleges and on the educational landscape at second level;
• the replication of courses across third level;
• the need to increase interest in science, technology and related courses;
• the skills young people need to participate effectively in third level courses and approaches that might be taken at both second level and third level to develop and nurture these skills.

A further paper is being prepared by Dr. Tom Collins (formerly NUI Maynooth) on behalf of university heads. Individuals will be able to participate in this important dialogue on-line and pre -conference papers and updates can be viewed at www.transition.ie.

Please let us know what you think by posting or emailing (showard@tui.ie) observations to TUI Head Office.