Students who sat the “traditional” Leaving Certificate examinations in November received their results at midday today.
The usual Leaving Certificate examinations that take place in June of every year were cancelled last year, due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Out of 1700 of the 2155, just under 8 in 10, of the students that chose to sit the November exams also received Calculated Grades in the summer. In the exams that these students took, 39% of their grades increased from their Calculated Grades.
The final certificate combines the best results from both processes. These results are subject to appeal, and it is possible that there will be further upgrades.
All candidates entered for the 2020 Leaving Certificate were given the opportunity to sit the November exams.
The majority of the students taking the exams did receive Calculated Grades in the summer, however, there were also approximately 460 candidates who were unable to access Calculated Grades as they were studying one or more subjects outside of school, or who chose to forego the Calculated Grades progress.
On average, the students in November sat just over two exams each, with Biology and Maths dominating the subject choices.
Some 2,600 students applied to sit the exams, but only 2,155 presented at the exams.
The new examination results for students that were not able to avail of Calculated Grades, and also the changes in subject grades of some students, have been provided to the CAO.
Any student who received an upgrade in the Leaving Cert will be offered a deferred place in the next academic year.
In late September, 6,100 students had the Leaving Certificate upgraded after the discovery of coding errors in the calculated grading system.
Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Education Minister Norma Foley,emphasised their commitment at the start of this year that Leaving Certificate students would sit exams this year.
However, in light of the current school closures, government is coming under pressure to revise this. The Irish Second Level Students’ Union conducted a poll in which a choice between physical exams and Calculated Grades was the most popular for this year’s examinations.
