Rose Conway-Walsh on Leaving Cert, broadband and school inequality

I was unfortunate enough to get two questions with the Taoiseach today, a bit like the buses, so I do apologise and also if any of the questions that I raise have been answered, don't worry about answering them again, I can pick them up on the transcript from this committee. Now, I am delighted to have this session here today and thank you for your statements on it. I think we are all on the right track here in where we need to be in relation to the Leaving Cert. A couple of questions just around what do you think the key characteristics are of the current Leaving Cert system that perpetrates educational disadvantage here, just some of those key points. In terms of the Leaving Cert next year, how would you see it panning out? Obviously, people who are doing the Leaving Cert now or who are in Leaving Cert year are really concerned about maybe time they are going to miss because of being close contacts or having to stay away, and time that they have already missed in the Leaving Cert cycle as well. Are you happy with where things are at in relation to how that is, and how are we going to tackle the grade inflation for next year? I just need to say something in terms of broadband because I am coming across students all of the time who are disadvantaged upon disadvantage in relation to broadband, and I want to ask all of you, I suppose, if you have had input into the broadband plan and the choices that are made around that, because if I look at the County of Mayo and I see where the areas that already have certain speeds seem to be prioritised again, where certain geographical areas continue to be left out. And students now, second level students are being told that it will be 2026 and 2027 before their household gets included. That is a real serious problem for us in terms of the digital divide and disadvantage there. So, I would like to see yourselves having a key role in decisions that are made there. I welcome where you have mentioned about computer science and the subjects that are available on the curriculum matching up to what is needed in our workforce and for our future development. But what concerns me is that while computer science is available in some schools, it is not available in others. I have a particular interest in this because my son wants to do computer science this year, but he has to do it all on his own. So, while a school in Dublin or in another area or in a higher population may be able to do computer science through the curriculum, he is at a severe disadvantage in trying to teach himself computer science. I am sure that is the same for many youngsters across the board. So, maybe just to address those things first, and I really believe in Jesh schools, I have to say. I do not see any stigma whatsoever around Jesh schools. I have seen the brightest of pupils coming from Jesh schools. Those supports are really important, but I find it unusual here to see that there is a stigma attached to it, because that would never have come into my psyche at all. Thank you. DEPUTY, if I may, and even before you mentioned Jesh schools, in my reply I was going to reference it, because certainly from my point of view over the years, in the context of educational disadvantage, I would urge the state to invest in the Jesh scheme, because as far as I am concerned, that is the best way in which we can help the disadvantaged students in our system. I have seen the work that has been done in Jesh schools over the years, especially in urban Jesh schools, and it is marvellous, and I think we do need to make sure that we properly invest in Jesh schools over time. I think it is key for us and hugely important. In the context of next year's Leaving Cert, we are going back towards a more traditional model of assessment, all going well. We certainly learned from the accredited grades and calculated grades process. We are not sure obviously what is going to emerge, and we are all very concerned about the grade inflation and what happened with regard to the CEO this year. That is something that we will have to engage as partners in the education sphere on. I suppose at the moment we have been so intent on finishing Leaving Certificate 2021, managing the appeals processes around that, that it is only now really that our minds will turn in a substantive way to what is going to happen next year with regard to the Leaving Certificate and the Junior Certificate, and the points you made about grade inflation is very, very valid and something that we will have to wrestle with. Certainly, if I may, in the context of broadband, we are in touch with the Department of Education all the time with regard to ensuring that broadband facilities around the country are as good as they can be, and we will continue to pursue that because, as you say, there were issues around that during the time of school closure. There was progress in certain areas around it, but certainly there is work that can be done. I might make one general point, if I may, and I suppose it is incumbent on us when we have so many people here from the different political parties. The frustration, and it has been referenced earlier on, the frustration we find as education partners is that we have an education system that is highly valued. The OECD report on education that was referenced earlier is fulsome in its praise. Ireland, one of the high performing education systems across OECD countries, that is how it introduces its report. But we have this difficulty around the proportion of GDP that is invested in education in any given year. And I would ask people here perhaps to reflect on that. We have a marvellous education system. We want to reform, we want to change, but we do need to be able to develop our infrastructure in so doing. Thanks very much, Deputy. Thank you. Deputy, if I could come in, John Erwin here, I would just like to say in terms of the DESH schools, I would agree and disagree with your comments. There are fantastic people and fantastic performance by DESH schools. The DESH programme itself, as both Paddy and Paul have referenced, has been generally very successful. But there is a difference between urban and rural DESH. Is that OK? And in certain urban areas, if you have a DESH school which is very inclusive, they will obviously, not obviously, but on a significant number of occasions, probably carry a greater burden and probably a greater range of students than other schools within that area. There still is a little bit of the soft barriers in place in certain schools, irrespective of the admissions policy, where some schools are seen as, well, you know, that's the school you would attend. And there's a little bit of that still. So when Paul says stigma, I think there's a little bit of that particularly in the larger urban settings. But there are tremendous successes. And look, we have 96 community and comprehensive schools of those 30 or DESH. So look, we would be a huge proponent of supporting DESH, as John Curtis has said. I would say in terms of grade inflation, you see, look, we've got to really take a look at what the purpose of senior cycle is. And it's the fact that we're married to progression into third level. And that has such a backwash effect on the entire senior cycle. And this is a particular problem at a particular time because of particular crisis. So when we go, I'd have to agree fully with Patty, Patty Flood, in terms of when we bring in new systems and we extend and have a far more diverse range of assessments, including in school based assessment, we would have to have more robust moderation systems in place to sort of ward against that type of inflation and consistency over the years and across years. OK, thank you very much.