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This report is intended to inform the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) review of senior cycle and draws on the second cycle of the consultation process with 41 schools with different profiles and characteristics. Building on the first cycle which examined the purpose of senior cycle, the second cycle focused more specifically on pathways and structures within the senior cycle and on the kinds of learning experiences teachers, students and parents would like to see. The findings point to a consensus across all groups on the need to spread assessment over the course of senior cycle and adopt a greater variety of assessment approaches.

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A number of countries, including Ireland, have experienced a recent growth in the prevalence of ‘shadow education’, that is, paid private tuition outside the schooling system. Previous international studies have indicated that such tuition can enhance academic performance and facilitate access to tertiary education. However, such studies have rarely taken account of important differences between those taking private tuition and other students. This paper explores the characteristics of students taking private tuition and the impact of such tuition on academic outcomes in the Republic of Ireland. Participation in private tuition is disproportionately concentrated among students from middle-class families, those with higher prior performance and those with greater engagement in the schooling process. When the selective nature of the group taking private tuition is accounted for, private tuition yields no advantages in terms of upper secondary examination performance. It is argued that, rather than representing a rational strategy for the middle classes to secure educational advantage, participation in private tuition must be seen in the context of the competitive examination system in operation.

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Ireland has experienced an unprecedented level of economic growth since the mid-1990s. The present article assesses the extent to which this phenomenon has altered the level and nature of youth unemployment, using data from six waves of a nationally representative survey of school-leavers. The main impact of the ‘Celtic Tiger’ has been to smooth the transition from school to paid employment, significantly reducing the proportion of young people unemployed. The profile of the unemployed has changed markedly. Social class and examination grades have become less important predictors while parental employment and having upper-secondary qualifications have become more significant in shaping employment chances. In particular, the qualifications gap has continued to widen in the post-boom period, with employment growth not sufficient to counter the marginalisation of less qualified young people within the labour market. It is argued that the exploration of youth unemployment in the Irish context provides more general insights into the dynamics of youth transitions.

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David Raffe was a highly influential figure in the field of transitions research. His work carefully delineated how national institutional policies shape transition processes and outcomes. Curriculum structure and organisation were seen as key features of these transition systems, his work tracing the relative impact of vocational and academic qualifications across countries and exploring tendencies towards, and away from, unified qualification frameworks. This paper builds upon David's work by unpacking the influence of curriculum choices in secondary education on young people's labour market destinations in Ireland and Scotland, two countries which share many similarities in their transition and post-16 education systems but differ in the degree of student subject choice at upper-secondary level. Using regression analyses of school leavers' survey data from both countries, we analysed the extent to which subjects studied and grades achieved in secondary school matter for young people's occupational opportunities. We found that subject choice matters for employment chances and access to higher status positions in Scotland but to only a limited extent in Ireland. Grades matter for employment chances in Ireland while higher grades enhance access to higher quality jobs in both countries. The conclusions offer some reflections on David's most recent work and his legacy.

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This article is part of a special issue entitled 'Bridging divides: social science, educational policy and the improvement of education and training systems: an appreciation the contribution of David Raffe (1950-2015)', guest edited by Cathy Howieson, Ken Spours and Michael Young. Show less

International research into educational decision-making has been extensive, focusing on the way in which young people and their families assess the different options open to them. However, to what extent can we assume that different groups of young people have equal access to the information needed to make such an assessment? And what role, if any, do schools play in this process? Using in-depth qualitative interviews from two schools with very different student intakes, this paper examines the key influences that shape young people's choices. Decisions about whether to go on to higher education are found to reflect three sets of processes: individual habitus; the institutional habitus of the school, as reflected in the amount and type of guidance provided; and young people's own agency - namely, the conscious process whereby students seek out information on different options and evaluate these alternatives.

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This article explores the nature and implications of secondary students’ participation in paid employment in Ireland. The analysis draws on a comprehensive survey of one-sixth of seconday schools. Results indicate that working part-time is associated with underperformance at upper secondary level and also leads to increased dropout. In line with research in other countries, part-time employment tends to draw students away from their studies. Such underperformance at upper secondary level persists regardless of the level of involvement in out-of-school social activies. Results hold when propensity score matching methods are employed to take account of possible selection effects. The discussion points to the crucial importance of early educational qualifications in longer-term and lifelong labour market outcomes; and highlights the importance of addressing the issue of student employment given its impact on educational outcomes.

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Previous research has indicated significant variation between schools in the proportion of their students who go on to higher education. However, relatively little attention has been paid to the specific school characteristics influencing application and entry to tertiary education. This paper sets out to analyse the individual and school factors which influence the transition to higher education in the Irish context. The paper draws on a large-scale study of 4,400 students within 108 secondary schools in the Republic of Ireland. Almost three-quarters of the students in the sample applied for a higher education course. However, schools varied in the application rates of their students. These differences are found to be related to the background characteristics of students (in terms of gender, social class and prior ability) along with the institutional habitus of the school. It is found that school factors associated with increased college application rates do not necessarily appear to yield higher rates of college entry but rather that successful entry to tertiary education is related to general academic effectiveness in the school.

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The relationship between gender, social background, educational level and early labour market outcomes has been well documented internationally. However, much less consideration has been given to the influence of field of study on early labour market transitions, especially from a comparative perspective. This paper examines the complex relationship between gender, social background, educational level, field of study and young people's early occupational outcomes. It draws on the Eurostat Labour Force Survey [LFS] 2000 Ad Hoc Module on School to Work Transitions which incorporates data from a large number of countries from different parts of Europe. Previous research based on the LFS 2000 Ad-hoc-module on Transitions from School to Work has shown the persistence of educational segregation in terms of gender across European countries with more pronounced segregation in some countries than in others (Smyth, 2002). Parental education has been found to be a significant factor affecting young people's educational and occupational opportunities (Iannelli, 2002). However, the degree of advantage or disadvantage associated to different social backgrounds varies across countries, being strongest in the Eastern European countries and weaker in the Nordic countries.

This paper develops upon this earlier research to explore the complex interrelationship between social background and gender in shaping young people's careers. The first section of the paper examines the way in which educational level and field are influenced by social background (measured in terms of parental education) and gender. The second part of the paper focuses on examining the relationships between educational level and field and early transition outcomes, principally access to employment and occupational status, and the extent to which these relationships differ by gender and social background.

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Selected papers from this conference are indexed from TD/TNC 87.466 to TD/TNC 87.478. Show less

This paper uses data drawn from the European Union Labour Force Survey 2000 Ad Hoc Module on School to Work Transitions to explore the influence of gender and social background (measured in terms of parental education) on young people’s educational and early labour market outcomes across 12 European countries. Our results show that social background is strongly related to the level of education achieved while gender is found to have a stronger effect on the field of study selected. Countries vary in the extent to which gender and social background affect young people’s outcomes. Gender differentiation in labour market outcomes reflects the nature of the welfare regime, being more pronounced in familial and conservative systems. Social inequality in educational attainment and early labour market outcomes are less marked in Finland and Sweden, reflecting the combination of less differentiated educational systems, mass higher education and social-democratic welfare regimes. In contrast, social inequality is more marked in the Eastern European countries, due partly to their highly differentiated educational systems but more notably to rapid changes taking place in post-communist systems.

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This article explores social class and gender differences in entry to the two main higher education sectors, universities and institutes of technology, among school leavers in Ireland over the period 1980-2006. A rational choice perspective is adopted, with participation hypothesised to reflect the costs and benefits attaching to attending the two types of institution. The initial expansion of higher education resulted in a widening of the participation gap between the higher professional and other groups, with some reduction thereafter as higher professional groups reached near-saturation levels. The removal of higher education tuition fees in 1996 was not sufficient to increase working-class participation in a context where other direct costs remained high and employment represented an attractive option. The period analysed saw a significant shift in the gender composition of higher education entrants, with young women now making up the majority. This article points to the value of taking a dynamic approach to analysing higher education participation, unpacking the effects of expansion in provision and of the costs and benefits attached to higher education entry.

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