Minister for Education Norma Foley has promised to take the “appropriate time” to consider opposition to reform of the Leaving Certificate. 

The Government had announced that students would sit Irish and English Paper One in fifth year from 2024. 

The idea was to ease the pressure on students by spreading their exams out over a longer period of time. 

However, today Minister Foley confirmed the change had been delayed in order to allow further reflection. 

“We are taking the appropriate time,” she said. 

“Which will allow further engagement and consideration by all concerned and I have been very clear that this would be a process that would be born of engagement and consultation with everyone. 

“Indeed, all the steps we’ve taken thus far have been as a consequence of that. 

“So, we will take the time now.” 

Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast ahead of the announcement, Miriam Duggan, President of the ASTI, said the union opposed the decision for a number of reasons. 

“When the Minister made the original decision, it was made without any consultation,” she said. 

“And when we heard the proposal, we immediately started seeing issues with it.” 

Students at Belvedere College in Dublin, sit the first day of the Leaving Cert. Image: Mark Stedman/RollingNews

Chief among their concerns was students would have to sit exams before they had learnt all the skills they needed to do well in them. 

“For Irish, it made absolutely no sense,” she said. 

“There’s four skills there - there’s oral, there’s aural, there’s writing and there’s reading - and they’re all learnt together. 

“So, it just made no sense that at the end of one year, you’d split off [the] sections… it seemed to move against international best practice.”

Main image: Minister for Education Norma Foley. Photograph: Sam Boal / RollingNews.ie