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Standardisation and Processing of Data by the State Examinations Commission
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Research makes clear that because teacher judgements are made in the context of each school, they need to be examined and adjusted at a national level to ensure comparability across different schools and that a common national standard is applied. For this reason, the school estimated percentage marks will be combined with recent national data through a process called standardisation in order to generate the SEC Accredited Grade for the students in the subject. This standardisation process will bring the data sets into alignment with each other and will be used to ensure the SEC Accredited Grades reflect standards that are aligned across schools and with a common national standard.
The standardisation process being used will not impose any predetermined mark on any individual in a class or a school, nor will it use historical school-level data on past performance in Leaving Certificate Examinations.
Estimated percentage marks will be collected from each school. Though the prior performance of the class group in Junior Cycle may be used in this process, the individual performance of the student at Junior Cycle would not be a determinant of their performance at Leaving Certificate, other than when the subject is being taken outside of school.
If the group of students in a school in the current year is particularly “strong”, the expected level of achievement of the group will reflect that fact. Likewise, if one or more individuals stand out as particularly strong, that will be reflected in the school’s estimated marks and thereby be taken into account.
After the standardisation process, the marks will be converted into SEC Accredited Grades, which will be expressed in the same manner as currently applies to Leaving Certificate grades – H1 etc.
Candidates will receive the combined outcomes of their SEC Accredited Grades and their examinations (if they choose to sit examinations) at the same time. Where, in any subject, a student has also sat the examination, he/she will be credited with the better of the two results. The candidate’s results will be transferred to the CAO to facilitate progression to higher education.
A short time following the issue of results, candidates will have access to more detailed information about both sets of results. They will be able to see the estimated marks submitted by their school and the SEC Accredited Grades following the standardisation process. For candidates who took the certificate examinations, they will be able to see the marks awarded in the written examination, and the marks awarded in any components.
For candidates who did not take the Leaving Certificate Examinations the estimated percentage marks submitted by the school and the SEC Accredited Grades only will be available.
This information will aid candidates who may opt to appeal a result in a subject.
Read the complete text version of A Guide to State Examinations and Accredited Grades for Leaving Certificate 2021 or download a pdf copy below:
