Applying for college-you are all so lucky

[n2005]

Posted: 10/5/06 at 10:46am

I live in Ireland and I have been reading all the college/education topics. In this country , high school is 5 years 3 years then exams then 2 years and exams. The final exam is the leaving certificate. This means we study 7/8 subjects for 2 years. Hve to do Irish English Maths and a foreign language - usually french. Then we have the dreaded leaving cetr. This is 10 days of exams. Day 1 is a 7hour English exam, Day 2 7 hours of Irish- you get the idea. The papers are then sent to be corrected anon. We get the results 2 months later in August. Grades are converted to points. E.g 90%+ is an a1 which is 100 points. Each college course has a points reqiurment. If you get the points you get the place. No interviews,essays,extra cirr. activity etc. Purely academic. So, if you have one bad day its all over!! You have to go back and do it all again!! Very stressful on people really . Things like medicine reqiure 590 or 600 points. 600 is the max so you have to get over 90% in everythind which is hard cos you might be a maths whizz but stink at languages! Anyway just thought I'd share this .

[ILoveMyDictionary]

Posted: 10/5/06 at 6:46pm

Wow. I don't think I'd ever graduate. Especially since I slack off alot. I doubt I'd ever get by in Ireland.