Aguisín E;  Executive Summary of Report in English – 12 January 2026

 

Leaving Certificate 2026 – Bonus Marks for answering LC examinations through Irish eroded by administrative decision taken within SEC, causing significant disadvantage to LC 2026 class – Executive Summary of report:  (Ardteistiméireacht 2026 – Marcanna Bónais as freagairt trí Ghaeilge – faillí agus éagóir ar Rang Ardteistiméireachta 2026)

 

This Executive Summary documents an acknowledged and remediable inequity in

the application of Irish-language bonus marks that will uniquely disadvantage the

Leaving Certificate Class of 2026 unless corrective action is taken.

 

 

Challenge and disadvantage to LC 2026 students

Bonus Marks for answering LC examinations through Irish eroded by an administrative decision taken within SEC, causing ongoing significant disadvantage to LC 2026 class.  SEC and DEY have undertaken to correct the issue in time for LC 2027 but that leaves LC cohort 2026 facing a significant disadvantage that could cost individual students up to 43 CAO points if they take certain optional subjects that have investigations, reports or project work as mandatory components.

An LC 2026 student and an LC 2027 student achieving identical results in identical subjects may therefore receive materially different CAO outcomes solely due to cohort timing.

 

LC Bonus Marks:  Background and Government Policy

When the free secondary scheme was introduced in Ireland over 50 years ago, the Minister for Education established certain policy measures to ensure that the emerging Irish-medium post-primary sector would survive and thrive.  One key measure implemented by the Minister for Education as Government policy, was the awarding of Bonus marks in LC examinations where the entire examination script was completed through Irish.  Rule 29 of Department of Education’s Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools, https://www.gov.ie/en/department-of-education/publications/rules-and-programme-for-secondary-schools/  DEY’s schools’ operational governance manual, highlights for students, parents and schools the operational methodology of awarding the bonus marks:

Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools 2004/2005 (p 13):

Bonus marks at the rate of 10% of the marks obtained will be given to a candidate who obtains less than 75% of the total marks in the case of the following subjects…

18 subjects were awarded bonus marks @ 10% of marks achieved, with tapering downwards for any candidate who achieved in excess of 75% in any examination.  A further 9 subjects deemed to have less written language content, were awarded bonus marks @ 5%, again with tapering for higher achieving students achieving more than 75%.  The bonus marks were part compensation for students working through 2 language versions of exam papers within the LC examination hall, and in certain subjects having only summaries of textbooks available in Irish, or in many subjects no textbooks or other Irish language resources at all available, as is still the case today.

This long-standing and publicly articulated practice created a legitimate expectation among students, parents, and Irish-medium schools regarding the consistent application of Irish-language bonus marks.  This legitimate expectation has been reinforced by schools and school principals who highlighted the provisions outlined in the DEY publication Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools 2004/2005 (p 13):

Bonus marks at the rate of 10% of the marks obtained will be given to a candidate who obtains less than 75% of the total marks in the case of the following subjects

This is a huge challenge for schools that depend on DEY and SEC to deliver the arrangements that they themselves have published and distributed to schools. DE and SEC advice issued to examiners and widely distributed by Gaelcholáistí and Gaeltacht schools as part of their open night information packs to parents and students, clearly shows that in past years LC Irish bonus applied to the entirety of an individual student’s written work within the relevant list of 18 subjects in line with Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools. (See Appendix C of Tuairisc).

 

Commission on Points System 1999 – Government Policy confirmed by Mícheál Martin, Minister for Education

The Report of The Commission on Points System 1999, made a number of recommendations which were widely debated.  Minister for Education, Mícheál Martin TD, confirmed in November 1999 that the system heretofore as outlined in Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools (p.13) regarding awarding bonus marks on the entirety of a student’s written work as part of each LC subject would continue indefinitely as Government Policy as had been the case for many years, providing certainty to students, parents and Irish-medium post-primary schools.

 

Administrative decision taken within DE/SEC to erode effect of Bonus Marks

In recent years, the SEC adopted a revised operational practice under which compulsory written project, report, investigative study, and coursework components of certain LC subjects were excluded from Irish bonus mark calculations. This revised practice is at odds with Minister Martin’s previously stated position as Education Minister. SEC practice in recent years has been to apply the bonus marks only to 80% of the examination that occurs during June each year. These mandatory written project components are worth 20% of many subjects and will increase to 40% of all subjects shortly. This represents a substantive narrowing of eligibility for Irish-language bonus marks rather than a neutral technical adjustment to assessment design.  This is at odds both with the information supplied by DE to students and parents annually in Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools 2004/2005 (p 13), and also with Minister Martin’s previously stated position as Education Minister:

Bonus marks at the rate of 10% of the marks obtained will be given to a candidate who obtains less than 75% of the total marks in the case of the following subjects…

SEC practice in recent years has been to only apply the bonus marks to the 80% of the examination that occurs during June each year.  These mandatory written project components are worth 20% of many subjects and will increase to 40% of all subjects shortly.

The revised practice raises several substantive governance issues for LC 2026 students:

• Who made the decision to erode the bonus marks and on what authority as it flies against Government Policy and Minister for Education’s publicly stated position?
• Where are the records of any such decision recorded and why was no public consultation or Parliamentary debate afforded? Why were Irish-medium schools and students not directly informed by SEC regarding SEC’s decision to curtail and erode bonus marks?
• Why is DEY not implementing its own rules as outlined in Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools (p.13), published by DEY and traditionally was distributed in hard copy to schools each year?
• Why is SEC and DEY not implementing the fix to the problem that they have acknowledged until LC 2027?

During Q2 2025, SEC and DEY promised to publish before May 2025, the details of the proposed fix to be implemented within each subject regarding identifying and publishing a consistent application of bonus marks for scripts completed through Irish.  https://oide.ie/post-primary-news/senior-cycle-redevelopment-implementation-support-measures/

 

There are significant policy and operational matters to determine prior to providing details of how such arrangement will be applied in respect of the AACs associated with relevant subjects commencing with those in Tranche 1 (in respect of LC 2027). Relevant information and an outline of the parameters that will be applied in this regard will be communicated by the end of May 2025 (p. 17).

 

Action 12, Completion date May 2025 by DEY/SEC:  Clarify policy position and parameters to apply to the allocation of Irish Bonus Marks for completing a subject through Irish in the context of AACs. (p. 18).

 

This commitment has not been fulfilled, despite LC 2026 being within months of examination completion.  Why has SEC and DEY not published this document to date (January 12 2026), and how can they reconcile that an acknowledged difficulty exists due to the inconsistent application of bonus marks, depending on which optional subjects a student happens to have chosen, but they do not propose to sort the issue until after LC 2026 has completed?  How is this fair to LC 2026 students, especially as the administrative decisions and actions taken by certain SEC officials appear to be in direct contravention of system requirements set out in S9 (b); S9 (f); and S9 (h) of Education Act (1998): https://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/1998/act/51/section/9/enacted/en/html#sec9

Where discretion exists in assessment administration, the Education Act requires that such discretion be exercised in a manner consistent with Ministerial policy and the promotion of the Irish language.

(b) ensure that the education provided by it meets the requirements of education policy as determined from time to time by the Minister,

(f) promote the development of the Irish language and traditions, Irish literature, the arts and other cultural matters,

(h) in the case of schools located in a Gaeltacht area, contribute to the maintenance of Irish as the primary community language,

 

Awareness and lobbying campaign

ETBs, Trade Unions, Gaeloideachas, Comhdháil Oileáin na hÉireann and other national organisations have highlighted the inequity of SEC’s current practice, not least because it was not directly highlighted to students in Gaeltacht schools and Gaelcholáistí that SEC was applying the bonus only to portions of their written examination work.  Consequently, a student’s choice of optional subjects could mean that DEY/SEC applied the Irish bonus to all written work completed within each subject chosen by the student, or only to 80% of the written work assessed in certain subjects, or even a mix of both, with some subjects at 100% and some at 80% (depending on an individual student’s choice of optional subjects and whether a project or SEC assessed course work was a mandatory component of LC examination or not).  DEY and SEC acknowledged the problem, and gave commitments in May 2025 to rectify the issue as outlined in Senior Cycle Redevelopment Implementation Support Measures [8 May 2025], (DEY, 2025, p 17 & 18) https://oide.ie/post-primary-news/senior-cycle-redevelopment-implementation-support-measures/

This acknowledgement confirms that the current application of Irish bonus marks is defective and cannot be justified as an optimal or equitable system for LC 2026 and therefore requires timely corrective action where feasible.

3.2.5 Coursework through Irish:   To reinforce the value of Additional Assessment Components (AACs) under SCR, and the importance of the Irish language, the Department in conjunction with the SEC has given consideration to the current scheme for the award of Irish Bonus Marks for completing a subject through Irish and it has been agreed that it will be extended to apply to AACs with a significant writing demand that have the capacity to be carried out through Irish.

SEC and DEY also gave commitments in the same publication P 18, to publish specifics of how the remediation measures would apply to each subject vis-a vis the application of bonus marks for scripts completed entirely through Irish, no later than May 2025, something that has not occurred by 12 January 2026, with less than 5 months to commencement of LC 2026.

There are significant policy and operational matters to determine prior to providing details of how such arrangement will be applied in respect of the AACs associated with relevant subjects commencing with those in Tranche 1 (in respect of LC 2027). Relevant information and an outline of the parameters that will be applied in this regard will be communicated by the end of May 2025. (p. 17)

 

Action 12, Completion date May 2025 by DEY/SEC:  Clarify policy position and parameters to apply to the allocation of Irish Bonus Marks for completing a subject through Irish in the context of AACs. (P 18)

Unfortunately, SEC and DEY have only committed to solving the acknowledged problem for LC 2027 cohort and all cohorts thereafter, leaving LC 2026 as a significant disadvantage.  The SEC current methodology of applying LC bonus marks only to part of completed written examination work, without any valid policy reason for so doing, may cost individual LC 2026 students up to 43 CAO points reduction, as outlined by worked examples of disadvantage visited on students at various grade levels in Appendix D of the report.

Applying Irish bonus marks to compulsory written coursework for LC 2026 would not alter subject specifications, assessment tasks, or grading standards; it would simply restore parity in the application of an existing policy measure.

Action required

Minister for Education and Youth must direct DEY and SEC to implement the remediation measures and deliver the commitments given by DEY in Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools (p.13), in time to remove the significant disadvantage facing LC 2026 students.  It is cold comfort to LC 2026 students that their colleagues in 2027 and each subsequent year will have the bonus marks fully applied correctly, as was advised as Government policy for 50+ years, but that they will be disadvantaged because the fix to the system has not been sorted in time for them not to be disadvantaged.

For Minister for Education and SEC to resolve this issue for LC 2026 is not a complicated process, as it takes no longer to calculate the value of the additional bonus marks for answering through Irish that should be awarded while including the marks earned from the written project/report/field study within any subject that has such work as a mandatory component of the examination, than calculating the bonus while excluding such work.  In either scenario it is a 5-10 second process adding the appropriate bonus marks from the relevant subject specific SEC issued Irish Bonus Marks table, as was correctly undertaken by Department of Education Examinations Branch examiners for 30+ years.  It does not require any revision of any subject syllabus or specifications, nor any revision or adjustment to LC examination papers, or assessment processes, rather it is a simple calculation applied at the last stage of computing the final mark awarded by SEC, such that the process is in compliance with Rule 29 of DEY publication Rules and Programmes for Secondary Schools.

If an official within SEC could decide by administrative action some time ago to not apply the Irish Bonus Marks for the mandatory coursework or project component of LC examinations assessed, and could apply that decision with immediate effect from that point thereafter, surely the Education Minister can reverse that decision just as quickly and revert to the longstanding practice of awarding the bonus to all written work assessed by examiners in calculating and implementing a final grade to be awarded.

LC 2026 students should not be required to bear the consequences of an acknowledged administrative failure that the State itself accepts must be corrected.

 

 

Report published 12 January 2026.

A note of gratitude and acknowledgement to LC 2026 students, to their parents and guardians in Gaeltacht and Irish-medium schools throughout Ireland, who assisted in highlighting this problem in having the LC bonus marks for answering through Irish awarded for the entirety of a student’s written examination work in .  A particular thanks is due to Comhdháil Oileáin na hÉireann, Gaeloideachas, TUI and other post-primary teacher unions, Boards of Management, Patron and Management Bodies, Students’ Unions, and many State and private bodies, including language rights organisations, who supported, advised and assisted both in researching and compiling aspects of this report and in progressing the on-going challenge to resolution, giving confidence and resolve all involved to continue to advocate for all LC 2026 students in Gaeltacht schools and in Gaelcholaistí throughout Ireland.