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A South Dublin high school is seeking research on how Leaving Cert scores were calculated after receiving significantly fewer higher grades than expected.
The Deutsche Schule de St Kilian in Clonskeagh is a private school that specializes in teaching German and has many children who are native speakers or who have spent significant periods of time in Germany.
While he expected half of his students to earn an H1 in German based on past performance, only 14% would get this grade based on the calculated grading process.
In a letter to the Department of Education, the school principal Alice Lynch expressed the school’s “deep concern” about the “very flawed process” applied to the calculation of German grades at the higher level of the school.
“The results we have received are not related to ability, past performance, or the calculated grade given to students at this school,” he stated.
“I want this to be investigated as it cannot be justified in any context given the nature of the school curriculum, student performance on German German exams and the school’s performance on German Leaving Certificate exams each year.
“St Kilian’s students have been seriously disadvantaged due to a distorted bias based on protests in the UK. Where is the justice here? How is it possible to correct this? “
‘Completely different grades’
Several other private or routine schools have said privately that their teacher’s estimated grades fell 20 to 40 percent, well above the national average of 17 percent.
One source said the decision to remove the “school profile” from the department’s standardization process may have ended up hurting high-performing schools.
The Department of Education, however, said the grading process was “blind” and there is no evidence of bias towards any type of school.
On the St Kilian’s issue, a spokeswoman for the Department of Education said Tuesday night that she had received the letter and would respond in due course.
Ms. Lynch said that in some cases, St Kilian’s students who received the same grade as estimated by teachers received “two completely different grades,” with a deviation of two grade levels.
In another case, he said “mother tongue” students were demoted from an H1 to an H2 or, in some cases, an H3.
Ms. Lynch said that students at the school who scored high on the Sprachdiplom German exams, considered much more challenging than the Leaving Cert, would have expected to get H1 grades. However, many ended up getting H2 or H3 ratings.
“These students have reached the level of linguistic competence to study at a German university,” he wrote. “Please explain to me the justice of an algorithm that can do things so completely wrong.”
Overall, the school’s teachers estimated that their students would earn 19 H1 grades, based on their past performance. However, only six achieved H1.
In all, Lynch said 24 students were lowered from their calculated German grade by just one grade. Eight other students were demoted by two grades. Only nine students received a grade in line with their teachers’ estimates, he added.
Meanwhile, Higher Education Minister Simon Harris said he has secured an additional 500 higher education slots in a bid to ease pressure on the points when the CAO results are released on Friday.
This brings the total number of additional higher education places this year, including those that must meet demographic growth, to about 5,000 or 10 percent of the total number of college places for freshmen.
There has been growing concern about the impact of grade inflation on this year’s college applicants who are using results from previous years. Thousands of these students argue that their results will be devalued and that, as a result, they will lose university places.
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