One-in-three who appealed Leaving result gets upgrade

ALMOST one-in-three students who appealed a Leaving Certificate result will receive the good news that they have had their marks upgraded. The State Examinations Commission (SEC) received appeals in relation to 10,398 grades in individual subjects from 6,127 people who got their results in August, with thousands of people appealing more than one result.

According to statistics relating to the outcomes being made available today, 2,076 upgrades have resulted from the remarking of the subjects concerned over the past month. The overall success rate of 20% is a slight increase on the 19.5% of appealed results which were upgraded on appeal last year.

As reported by the Irish Examiner last month, the debacle over the rescheduled Leaving Certificate English papers in June did not result in any increase in appeals for the subject. The SEC had 2,031 higher-level and 63 ordinary-level exams remarked, down 7% from 2,249 appeals on English marks a year ago.

Overall, there were 8% fewer results appealed compared with the 2008 Leaving Certificate, with the largest number relating to English, in keeping with previous years. Higher-level biology and geography were the next most common subjects appealed, with the 31% upgrade level for biology up significantly from just 23% last year.

The other higher-level science subjects, chemistry and physics, resulted in upgrades in just 13.6% and 12.8% of appealed papers being upgraded.

The SEC will make the outcomes of appeals known through schools or on its website (www.examinations.ie), where students can check their updated results from midday today.

The appeal results are also being sent to the Central Applications Office (CAO) which handles the filling of college places for most of the country's third-level institutions.

Leaving Certificate points increases might carry some students over the requirement for a course for which their application was previously unsuccessful. But many colleges ask those who become eligible after results are upgraded to defer until the following year because a course is already full or may have started a few weeks ago.

There is a further appeals process for exam candidates who are not satisfied with the outcome of the appeals being released today. They can apply to view their re-marked exam papers through their school up to Friday or directly to the SEC by next Tuesday evening, and viewings will take place at the commission's offices in Athlone, Co Westmeath, on Saturday, October 17.

The option is then to apply for the Independent Appeals Scrutineers to check that due process has been followed and all appeal procedures were properly carried out.

The total 10,398 grades which were appealed are out of a total of 371,874 grades issued to the 54,196 people who took Leaving Certificate exams this year. The SEC has also processed a small number of appeals in relation to Leaving Certificate Applied subjects.