Journal articles on the topic 'Leaving Certificate examination'

The potentials of literary texts are numerous. Literary texts can be used as basis for the teaching of the four traditional skills. They can also be used to develop learners‘ cultural competence. In Literature classes preparing for ―Baccalaureate A‖ written examination, literary texts are expected to be used frequently with regard to the profile of students in this section. The purpose of this study is to analyse the types of texts given at the ―Baccalaureate A‖ written examination in the last thirty years. In this study, quantitative and qualitative data are collected. Baccalaureate written English papers are the main focus of our collection. Teachers and supervisors are interviewed. The study is grounded on ―Reader-Response Theory‖ which stresses the interactions between the reader and the text. The results of the study show that the great majority of texts proposed for ―Baccalaureate A‖ examination, in the last thirty years, are non-literary texts. The consequence of this reduction in the use of literary texts may explain teachers‘ gradual lack of motivation to use them in class, or vice-versa, everything that is likely to have a negative impact on the performance of students from this class.

Studies revealed that college readiness promotes college success and higher education student learning outcomes. This study opted to 1) analyze the total effect and the conditional effect of college readiness on college success by university generations and departments; 2) analyze the differences in the probability of college success across departments and university generations; 3) describe the quality of university generations in terms of the conditional effects and the probabilities of college success. The study is an ex post facto research. The Ethiopian 1st, 2nd, and 3rd generation universities; and the Ethiopian National Assessment and Evaluation Agency officers were the population of the study. The total sample size was 551. The Ethiopian General Education School Leaving Certificate Examination Grade Point Average, the Ethiopian Higher Education Entrance Examination score, and the College Cumulative Grade Point Average of the students were sources of the data. Using the Process Procedure for Software Package for Social Sciences, the binomial logistic regression was conducted. Maintaining the highest total conditional effect of college readiness on college success while heightening the probability of college success at a value of college readiness has been interpreted as a trait of the high performing university generation.

Social studies education (SSE) is placed among the major academic disciplinary subjects within the school curriculum even from the primary/basic to the secondary level. It is a compulsory subject in the Secondary Education Examination (SEE) as well as it was also in the School Leaving Certificate (SLC) Examination. Importance of the subject itself has no question, despite that the content inside the subject and the delivery of the subject to the student are the major concerns. By the principle, the SSE is the combination of knowledge, skill and values of the society. It is the composition of the academic disciplinary subjects of social sciences, such as, geography, history, sociology, anthropology, civics, economics, psychology, culture including numbers of social issues and agendas in an integrated form including the past events in the study enables and inspires students to understand the present and become the bona fide citizens. The present paper has focused the position of geography content in the social studies of school education curriculum in Nepal. It has been over viewed in the context of content incorporated inside the subject according to the grades from basic to the secondary level and the delivery systems in each chapter. At the end, the final outcomes have been summarized as a form of suggestions to improve the disciplinary development of geography content in the social studies of school education curriculum. The Third Pole: Journal of Geography Vol. 17: 1-20, 2017

Most students do not follow the ‘academic track’ (i.e. A-levels) after leaving school and only about a third of students go to university before the age of 20. Yet progression routes for the majority that do not take this path but opt for vocational post-compulsory education are not as well-known, which partly has to do with the complexity of the vocational education system and the difficulty of deciphering available data. If we are to tackle long-standing problems of low social mobility and a long tail of underachievers, it is essential that post-16 vocational options come under proper scrutiny. This paper is a step in that direction.We use linked administrative data to track decisions made by all students in England who left compulsory education after having undertaken the national examination – the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) – at age 16 in the year 2009/10. We track them up to the age of 21, as they progress through the education system and (for some) into the labour market. We categorise the many different types of post-16 qualifications into several broad categories and we look at the probability of achieving various educational and early labour market outcomes, conditional on the path chosen at age 17. We also take into account the influence of demographics, prior attainment and the secondary school attended. Our findings illustrate the strong inequality apparently generated by routes chosen at age 17, even whilst controlling for prior attainment and schooling up to that point

A corelational research design was employed to examine if a relationship exists between organizational school climate and student achievement in Ethiopia secondary schools setting, and to investigate whether the various elements of school climate have independent effects on student achievement. Organisational climate was measured using the School Climate Index (SCI) developed by Tschannen-Moran, Parish and Dipaola and student achievement was measured by students’ test scores at the Ethiopia General Education Leaving Certificate Examination (GELCE) in the year 2014/15. A total of 32 schools, 973 teachers and 14882 students were involved in the study. Descriptive statistics such as mean and standard deviation, Pearson r correlation coefficient and multiple regression analysis were applied for the data analysis. The results indicate that school climate has a significant and positive relationship with student achievement in Ethiopia secondary schools, but nonetheless, a weak one. The collegial leadership, teacher professionalism, and academic press were significantly and moderately correlated to students’ achievement while the community engagement sub scale was not. The four factors used both for the SCI as predictor variables in the regression model were shown to have a significant relationship with student achievement when viewed as a whole, but they generated more varied results when examined individually. Teachers’ professionalism is the most positive predictor of student achievement in Ethiopia secondary schools. Similarly collegial leadership and academic press are also found to be significant predictor of academic achievement. This study found no independent effect of community engagement on student achievement. It is recommended that school leaders should design school improvement plans that entail the school climate construct. School leaders need to find ways of including the community in the life of the school and foster positive relationships with the community. Principals in particular need to be mindful that the climate of a school affect achievement and the former can be enhanced to improve results.

This study describes the performance of pupils in the First School Leaving Certificate (FSLC) examination English language composition paper in Kumba and neighbouring localities. It was reported by previous researchers that the performance of students in the GCE English paper was falling steadily. However, it was unfortunate that no research has checked what obtains at the level of the FSLC, which is the concern of the present study. To effectively tackle any problem it must begin from the roots. So, this study set out to analyze the grammatical features in the written production of Class Six pupils in the FSLC English language paper in Meme Division in the Southwest Region of Cameroon. This study was conducted to answer the question “what specific grammar features are observed in the written production?” The study had as main objective to identify specific grammar features in the writings of pupils in the basic schools around Meme Division. A descriptive survey design was adopted for this study, and it was carried out within the theoretical framework of error analysis propounded by S.P Corder (1974). The material for this study is the past FSLC English language composition scripts for the 2014, 2015, and 2016 academic year. A total of 168 scripts were collected for this study, that is, 56 scripts for each of the three academic year were collected. Errors were identified and classified under morphemic and word errors. The findings for the study revealed that, word error recorded 70.7% of 942 cases identified, while morphemic error recorded 29.2% of 942 errors identified. The researcher recommended that the government should ensure all teaching materials are available at the beginning of each academic year and to make sure that pedagogic inspectors do their job as they should.

Alexander Robertus Todd (Alex to his friends), was born in October 1907 in Cathcart, to the south of Glasgow. His father, Alexander Todd, of southern Scottish descent, was at first a clerk in the Glasgow Subway Railway Company and later its Secretary; subsequently he was the Managing Director of the Drapery and Furnishing Co–operative Society Ltd in Glasgow. He was ambitious to better himself and his family and although his formal teaching had ended at thirteen he held a strong regard for education and was determined, as was his wife Jane (née Lowry) that it should not be denied to their children. As their affluence increased they moved to the village of Clarkston, whence Alex had to trudge one and a half miles each day to the public school in Cathcart. One should recall that this was during wartime: life was hard and boots were of poor quality. At the age of eleven he passed the entrance examination to Allan Glen's school, the Glasgow High School of Science in the centre of the city. Among the teachers was Robert Gillespie, who taught chemistry and fostered Alex's growing interest in that subject. This gave him the impetus, after passing the Higher Leaving Certificate examination in 1924, to enter the University of Glasgow to read for an honours degree in chemistry. Once there, he was recognized by his teachers as a highly talented student, taking the James Black Medal and the Roger Muirhead Prize in his first year, which also gave him a scholarship for the rest of his course. Alex graduated BSc with first class honours in 1928 and was awarded a Carnegie Research Scholarship of €100 a year to work with Professor T.S. Patterson. He and his predecessor, G.G. Henderson, F.R.S., had strong interests in alchemy and the history of chemistry. The latter subject was even compulsory in the final year. Alex was interested in this and, much later in life, spoke and wrote knowledgeably on several aspects of the history of organic chemistry. Patterson's research interest was optical rotatory dispersion and, although Todd's first two papers were published jointly with Patterson in 1929 (1, 2)*, it was clear that a subject in which theory and practice made little contact was not for him. With encouragement from Patterson, Alex transferred to the University of Frankfurt to work in the laboratory of W. Borsche.

During a post-independence phase (1922-mid-sixties), Irish secondary schooling was characterised by low participation rates, elitism, and careerist perceptions of students. Phase two (1967-mid 1980s) saw participation rates expand dramatically as Ireland became more open and industrialised, and policymakers focused on relationships between education, human capital and economic development. During this phase, the Irish Times began to include careers and examinations information. With school completion rates continuing to increase from the mid-1980s (phase three), the two main daily newspapers realised that the growing need for information about access to an increasingly complex and highly-prized higher education system, which was dependent on academic achievement, afforded an opportunity to boost sales and advertising. In response, examinations’ coverage reached a level recently described as ‘exceptional by a team of researchers from the Oxford University Centre for Educational Assessment and Queen’s University Belfast.

The aim of this study was to investigate readiness of the Malawi National Examinations Board (MANEB) examiners’ in e-marking of national examinations and general use of technology with focus on their computer proficiency and perception. The study followed an explanatory sequential mixed methods research design and data was collected from sampled examiners through a questionnaire, a focus group discussion (FGD) and a computer proficiency assessment test. The findings show that over 90% of the participants had moderate to very high computer proficiency levels. The findings also show that both age and gender did not have any effect on the technology readiness index (TRI) of Primary School Leaving Certificate of Education (PSLCE) examiners but on Malawi School Certificate of Education (MSCE) examiners. The findings also indicate no effect of the examiners’ years of marking experience on their TRI. The distribution of examiners across TRI segments shows that the number of examiners increases with the increasing order of adoption propensity. In line with this, most examiners showed positive perception of e-marking of national examinations as well as moderate to very high computer proficiency level.

The secondary school-leaving examination is an important moment in the life of a young person. It is a kind of border after which acquired social skills and educational resources will affect the awakening and embedding of professional aspirations and will allow adults to make decisions on matters of further life path. This path begins in elementary school and counts in the student’s life for about twelve years. Therefore, it seems reasonable to assume that after such a period of education and pedagogical interactions, one would expect the student to know his strengths, passions, aspirations, and thus see the shape of his future life path and know how to implement it. It was assumed that with different curriculum curricula, access to knowledge is different, so the impact of these differences on the level of students’ professional aspirations was compared to examine the actual state of this phenomenon. At the beginning of the article, terminology and definitions of professional aspirations as well as their levels and conditions in the literature are presented. Then, the results of research carried out in two classes of the same high school, but learning in different core curricula, are presented. Finally, the results were summarized and conclusions were drawn. The study showed that different curricula gave different results of students’ knowledge.According to these indicators, the author made a corresponding comparison of the impact of these differences on the level of professional aspirations of students. In addition, the article describes in detail the actual state of the situation. The summarized results of the study on the teaching of classes in different programs made it possible to make suggestions for further educational prospects. The main conclusion is that educational programs for classes with Polish certificates require changes in the orientation of young people to their professional aspirations, in order to plan further educational and professional path.

The purpose of this article is to collect together separate pieces of information about A. Bogdanov’s exile in Vologda and retrace the conditions under which his formation as a politician and a thinker was taking place in those years. An outstanding scientist, philosopher, physician and revolutionary, Alexander Bogdanov spent three years in exile in Vologda (1901–03). A. Lunacharsky, A. Remizov, N. Berdyaev, B. Kistyakovsky, P. Shchegolev, B. Savinkov and his wife V. Uspenskaya, and many of the future prominent figures of the Bolshevik Party were in exile in Vologda during that period. For a year and a half, Alexander Bogdanov lived in the village of Kuvshinovo near Vologda and worked as a doctor at a psychiatric hospital, the description of which he later used in his science fiction novel Red Star. After leaving the service and obtaining permission for private practice, he used his practice as an excuse to visit his associates. He helped the Vologda exiles by giving them medical examination certificates to be submitted to the police, which allowed the exiles to stay in the governorate city rather than be sent to the remote settlements of Vologda Governorate. In the course of numerous discussions between exiles belonging to different philosophical and political camps, Bogdanov’s skill as a philosopher and polemicist was honed. Thanks to the tremendous dedication, hard work, and concentration on his scientific activities, Alexander Bogdanov had strengthened his reputation as a famous Marxist writer by the end of the exile. Moreover, due to his illegal correspondence with the editorial board of the Iskra newspaper, he established contacts with the leading circles of the emerging Bolshevik faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party. The time Alexander Bogdanov spent in exile in Vologda paid off and produced a great effect on his formation as a researcher and a political activist.

Background Looked after children are defined as children who are in the care of their local authority. Previous studies have reported that looked after children have poorer mental and physical health, increased behavioural problems, and increased self-harm and mortality compared to peers. They also experience poorer educational outcomes, yet population-wide research into the latter is lacking, particularly in the United Kingdom. Education and health share a bidirectional relationship; therefore, it is important to dually investigate both outcomes. Our study aimed to compare educational and health outcomes for looked after children with peers, adjusting for sociodemographic, maternity, and comorbidity confounders. Methods and findings Linkage of 9 Scotland-wide databases, covering dispensed prescriptions, hospital admissions, maternity records, death certificates, annual pupil census, examinations, school absences/exclusions, unemployment, and looked after children provided retrospective data on 715,111 children attending Scottish schools between 2009 and 2012 (13,898 [1.9%] looked after). Compared to peers, 13,898 (1.9%) looked after children were more likely to be absent (adjusted incidence rate ratio [AIRR] 1.27, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.24 to 1.30) and excluded (AIRR 4.09, 95% CI 3.86 to 4.33) from school, have special educational need (SEN; adjusted odds ratio [AOR] 3.48, 95% CI 3.35 to 3.62) and neurodevelopmental multimorbidity (AOR 2.45, 95% CI 2.34 to 2.57), achieve the lowest level of academic attainment (AOR 5.92, 95% CI 5.17 to 6.78), and be unemployed after leaving school (AOR 2.12, 95% CI 1.96 to 2.29). They were more likely to require treatment for epilepsy (AOR 1.50, 95% CI 1.27 to 1.78), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD; AOR 3.01, 95% CI 2.76 to 3.27), and depression (AOR 1.90, 95% CI 1.62 to 2.22), be hospitalised overall (adjusted hazard ratio [AHR] 1.23, 95% CI 1.19 to 1.28) for injury (AHR 1.80, 95% CI 1.69 to 1.91) and self-harm (AHR 5.19, 95% CI 4.66 to 5.78), and die prematurely (AHR 3.21, 95% CI 2.16 to 4.77). Compared to children looked after at home, children looked after away from home had less absenteeism (AIRR 0.35, 95% CI 0.33 to 0.36), less exclusion (AIRR 0.63, 95% CI 0.56 to 0.71), less unemployment (AOR 0.53, 95% CI 0.46 to 0.62), and better attainment (AIRR 0.31, 95% CI 0.23 to 0.40). Therefore, among those in care, being cared for away from home appeared to be a protective factor resulting in better educational outcomes. The main limitations of this study were lack of data on local authority care preschool or before 2009, total time spent in care, and age of first contact with social care. Conclusions Looked after children had poorer health and educational outcomes than peers independent of increased neurodevelopmental conditions and SEN. Further work is required to understand whether poorer outcomes relate to reasons for entering care, including maltreatment and adverse childhood events, neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities, or characteristics of the care system.

Purpose Integration and use of technology in teaching and learning in the education sector from pre-primary education (PPE) to the higher levels of education, is a policy issue. In developed countries, including Tanzania, information and communication technology (ICT), especially in PPE, is inadequately researched for laying evidence on its applicability in instruction and learning. Therefore, this paper aims to determine pre-primary teachers’ preparedness in integrating ICT in classroom instruction and challenges teachers face in integrating it for child’s meaningful learning. Design/methodology/approach Methods and instruments: a qualitative transcendental phenomenological approach was used in determining teachers’ preparedness in integrating ICT in PPE in Tanzania. It was further used to collect data that describe the teaching and learning through the integration of ICT in every session as their lived experience for pre-primary teachers. Its selection was appropriate as it allowed researchers to systematically analyse for description the commonalities and differences existing among the involved teachers in integrating ICT in teaching and learning as their lived experiences (Moerer-Urdahl and Creswell, 2004). To appropriately analyse teachers’ understanding and experiences regarding ICT and its integration in teaching and learning in pre-primary classes, semi-structured interviews and open-ended questionnaires were used for in-depth understanding of the study problem. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data through open-ended questions where researchers took an average of 40 min per session with participants’ (teachers) using notebooks to take note of their thoughts, feelings and beliefs about ICT integration in PPE. Use of the semi-structured interview was based on the reality that it provides in-depth information pertaining to participants’ experiences and viewpoints of a particular topic (Turner, 2010). Once the interview session was complete, each teacher was given a questionnaire to fill in for triangulating their experiences. Description of participants: a total of 14 schools constituting 28 teachers were purposively sampled and engaged in this study. Analysis of participants’ demographic characteristics indicates that all of the involved teachers had certificate in teacher education that qualified them as primary school teachers. Meanwhile, 18 (66.7 per cent) of the pre-primary school teachers who were involved in this study were female with only 10 (33.3 per cent) had working experience at and above five years of teaching in early grade classes. Study participants (teachers) from Itilima and Meatu Districts were purposively involved in the study as their experiences in young children’s learning and contextual influences (educational and training policy of 2014, the ICT policy of 2007, and foreign studies) are potential in improving the quality of learning. Study area: the current study was conducted in two districts (Itilima and Meatu) all found in Simiyu region. The two districts were selected and considered appropriate by the study as they constituted the 17 most disadvantaged rural areas in Tanzania (Mosha et al., 2015). Authors describe the two districts as having poor educational outcomes mainly relatively low pass rates in the primary school leaving examination results. In Itilima, one ward out of 22 was studied in which its six schools [with a total of 12 teachers] among 87 schools in the district were involved. While in Meatu district, eight of 121 schools [with a total of 16 teachers] in one ward of 29 wards were studied. This implies that a total of 14 schools and 28 teachers were involved in this study. Data analysis: the data collected through the interviews and open-ended questionnaires were subjected to content analysis procedures (reading and re-reading notes and transcripts followed by a three-steps-coding process consisting of open, axial and selective coding procedures). The analysis process was informed by the Vagle’s (2014) six steps for phenomenological research data analysis procedure (holistic reading of the entire text, first line-by-line reading, follow up questions, second line-by-line reading, third line-by-line reading, and subsequent readings). Practically, the researchers read and re-read the texts and transcribed data from the language used during data collection that is Kiswahili, into the reporting language that is English. Following transcription, data were coded for developing categories of data through axial and elective coding processes. Findings The data analysis was conducted and results and its discussion are presented in three sub-sections: preparedness of teachers in using ICT in teaching and learning; teachers’ views about the integration of ICT in teaching and learning; and challenges faced by teachers in integrating ICT in teaching and learning. Teacher’s preparedness in the use of ICT in teaching: exploration of teachers’ preparedness in integrating ICT in teaching and learning was preceded by exploration of teachers’ understanding of ICT in teaching and learning. Analysis revealed that majority of teachers were aware about ICT in teaching and learning and they understood it as the implementation of curriculum at school level that involves use of ICT-based facilities such as television, mobile phones, computer and radio. Teacher elaborated that appropriate use of ICT-based facilities that would later develop children to potentially improve their understanding and practical application in daily life. Other teachers understood ICT in teaching and learning as use of printed materials [newspapers and magazines] in facilitating pupil’s learning of planned lessons. While other teachers were aware of what ICT means the second category of teachers as noted in their responses, had limited understanding, as to them, ICT in education meant use of printed materials. Difference in teachers’ understanding of the ICT in teaching and learning also indicate some teachers viewing it as use of ICT facilities in developing children’s competencies in the specific subject. In the teachers’ views, ICT is considered as subject content and they delimited their understanding into that perspective ignoring it as technological use for facilitating meaningful learning in all subjects. Their views are based on the development of children with competencies useful in facilitating further learning in the subject known as Teknolojia ya Habari na Mawasiliano. Following the question based on exploring teachers’ understanding of ICT in teaching and learning, researchers explored teachers’ preparedness in using ICT in teaching and learning. Table 1.0 illustrates teachers’ multiple responses regarding their preparation. Table I: teacher’s preparedness in using ICT in teaching and learning. S/N; preparedness; freq; and per cent. Enhancing child’s understanding on the use of ICT-based facilities-20, 71.4; using remedial sessions teaching ICT-12, 42.8; using ICT-based facilities for teaching other classes-8, 28.5. Table 1.0 illustrates that teachers are prepared to enable children use ICT to access information and more knowledge related to their school subjects and general life. They were of the view that ICT could serve well in areas where text and supplementary books are scares or torn-out by pupils because were poorly bound or due to poor quality of papers used. Therefore, availability of ICT facilities in schools would become important resource-materials for pupils, as well as teachers. For instance, a teacher said that; Availability of ICT facilities, such as computers in schools will help us in preparing notes or content for supplementing their learning. Different from the paper-based notes, computers will keep our notes properly compared to the papers that get easily displaced and hard to retrieve notes when lost (Interview, 20 April 2016). In addition to the use of ICT facilities in serving as resource material, their use in schools would aid pupils and teachers to use them beyond teaching and learning. Teachers narrated that children may find games and puzzles that all help in stimulating their thinking, hence interest in schooling and further learning. Teachers also said they are prepared to use even extra hours that are beyond school timetable to ensure children learn well to meet the uncovered periods once facilities are placed in school. Use of extra hours beyond the normal school timetable comm. Research limitations/implications The study was limited to the accessed and involved schools as some schools were found to have no specific teachers teaching a pre-primary class on reasons the responsible teacher for the class had retired. As a result, researchers spend extended time to travel and reach schools that were located far from one school to the other. Again, some teachers were reluctant in participation on reasons that researchers are evaluating their competency for reporting to the higher authorities. Practical implications Differences in teachers’ understanding of the ICT in teaching and learning also indicate some teachers viewing it as the use of ICT facilities in developing pupils’ competencies in the specific subject. In the teachers’ views, ICT is considered as subject content and they delimited their understanding into that perspective ignoring it as technological use for facilitating meaningful learning in all subjects. Effective integration of ICT for efficiency in instruction depends on the teacher’s preparedness especially competency in using the equipments and infrastructures especially electric power. Social implications Integration of Information and Communication Technology in teaching and learning in PPE is socially important in the view that all children regardless of their background (urban or rural, affluent or poor) benefits in learning through use of technology. The children’s access to education integrating ICT would ensure equal opportunities for quality learning outcomes. In contrast, lack of exposing young children early in using ICT facilities for interaction and learning would adversely impact their participation in knowledge sharing in later years of schooling and employability opportunities. Originality/value There is limited empirical evidence about teachers' engagement in research particularly in PPE in Tanzania. Together with limited research in the level of education, this study is the original contribution to state of teachers at the school level about their engagement in integrating information and communication technology for informing education decision makers and administrators on matters of focus to improve educational instruction and implementation of Tanzania education and training policy, as well as the implementation of the ICT policy of 2016.

For many students studying accounting at third-level, this is not their first exposure to the subject. Their experience of the subject at secondlevel is likely to influence their expectations and their approach to the subject at third-level. Third-level accounting educators need to be aware of and understand the second-level environment if they are to maximise the learning experience of their students. This paper examines first-year business students’ experiences of accounting at second-level. A questionnaire was distributed to all first year students in Dublin City University Business School. An analysis of the responses revealed that the majority of teachers do not cover the full syllabus and that many students decide themselves to omit further topics when preparing for the Leaving Certificate examination. The analysis also revealed that students rate the Accounting paper as more predictable than examination papers in other subjects. An analysis of past Leaving Certificate Accounting papers supports the students’ views on the predicability of the papers.

This paper is concerned with one aspect of the efficiency of accounting education, that is the pass/fail performance of students at examinations. The paper initially looks at the two main elements of the admissions policy into Irish universities, namely the CAO preferences and CAO points. In addition, the impact of prior study of accounting on examination performance is investigated. The results of this study indicate that prior exposure to accounting (categorised between Leaving Certificate, Intermediate Certificate and none at all) was the most significant determinant of performance in first year exams but was of lesser importance in the second year exams.Also, there was a very strong relationship between performance in the mid-course MCQ exam and Summer exams in first year. Overall CAO points were related to overall score but not to pass/fail classification. However, there may be other important (but overlooked) variables which could be used to explain performance. There are a number of important implications arising from this study for overall admissions policy for Business Studies programmes and the allocation of teaching resources.

Improvement of quality of education is a challenging task; however, it is not impossible. Measuring the performance of schools is not straightforward. In general, number of students passed in the examination in terms of percentage is considered as performance of the schools. Knowing the factors to determine the performance of schools provides some ideas on how to improve the quality of education. The paper, therefore, seeks to show factors that affect performance of the institutional school. The data were collected using structured questionnaires and interview from 90 respondents of Chitwan district, Nepal. The performance of the schools is measured in terms of per cent of students passed in school leaving certificate examination. Improvement in library and laboratory facilities, parents-teacher interactions, drinking water and toilet facilities compared to previous level, and academic quality perceived by teachers determine the performance of the school. Some levels of improvement in playground and sports materials have power to improve the performance of the schools.

Background: In cases of brain pathology, current levels of cognition can only be interpreted reliably relative to accurate estimations of pre-morbid functioning. Estimating levels of pre-morbid intelligence is, therefore, a crucial part of neuropsychological evaluation. However, current methods of estimation have proven problematic. Objective: To evaluate if standardised leaving certificate (LC) performance can predict intellectual functioning in a healthy cohort. The LC is the senior school examination in the Republic of Ireland, taken by almost 50 000 students annually, with total performance distilled into Central Applications Office points. Methods: A convenience sample of university students was recruited (n = 51), to provide their LC results and basic demographic information. Participants completed two cognitive tasks assessing current functioning (Vocabulary and Matrix Reasoning (MR) subtests – Wechsler Abbreviated Scale of Intelligence, Second Edition) and a test of pre-morbid intelligence (Spot-the-Word test from the Speed and Capacity of Language Processing). Separately, LC results were standardised relative to the population of test-takers, using a computer application designed specifically for this project. Results: Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that standardised LC performance [F(2,48) = 3.90, p = 0.03] and Spot-the-Word [F(2,47) = 5.88, p = 0.005] significantly predicted current intellect. Crawford & Allen’s demographic-based regression formula did not. Furthermore, after controlling for gender, English [F(1,49) = 11.27, p = 0.002] and Irish [F(1,46) = 4.06, p = 0.049) results significantly predicted Vocabulary performance, while Mathematics results significantly predicted MR [F(1,49) = 8.80, p = 0.005]. Conclusions: These results suggest that standardised LC performance may represent a useful resource for clinicians when estimating pre-morbid intelligence.

This paper examines the place of geography in the school- level curriculum in Nepal. The rearm curriculum defines as the totality of student experiences that occur in the educational process. Specifically, it is referred to a planned sequence of instruction, or a view of the student'; experiences in terms of the educator; or school's; instructional goals. After the establishment of Durbar High School in Nepal in 1910 and the School Leaving Certificate Board in 1990, the subject of Geography was formally introduced. This subject had recognized as a compulsory subject at the school level curriculum before the NESP. After the NESP (1971), the issue had allocated 50 marks, becoming has becomes an optional subject since 1982. Geographic concepts have been taught after the introduction of the social studies curriculum at the secondary level since 1992.At present, geography is teaching in Nepal as an elective subject from secondary level to higher education. However, this subject seems less of a priority for students than mathematics, computer, and account. For this purpose, data collected from the review of the report published from the Education Commissions, Curriculum Development Center, the records of the National Examination Board, e-resources, and other concerned bodies. This paper concludes that geography subject at the school level is in a crisis. However, with the inclusion of geographic information systems (GIS) and spatial planning in the curriculum from the school level, the future of this subject looks bright.

ObjectivesLooked-after-children are defined as children who are in the care of their local authority. Previous studies have reported that looked-after-children have poorer mental and physical health, increased behavioural problems, and increased self-harm and mortality compared to peers. They also experience poorer educational outcomes yet population wide research into the latter is lacking, particularly in the UK. Education and health share a bidirectional relationship therefore it is important to dually investigate both outcomes. Our study aimed to compare educational and health outcomes for looked-after-children with peers, adjusting for sociodemographic, maternity and comorbidity confounders. ApproachLinkage of nine Scotland-wide databases, covering dispensed prescriptions, hospital admissions, maternity records, death certificates, annual pupil census, examinations, school absences/exclusions, unemployment, and looked-after-children provided retrospective data on 715,111 children attending Scottish schools between 2009 and 2012. ResultsCompared to peers, 13,898 (1.9%) looked-after-children were more likely to be absent and excluded from school, have special educational need and neurodevelopmental multimorbidity, achieve the lowest level of academic attainment, and be unemployed after leaving school. They were more likely to require treatment for epilepsy, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and depression, be hospitalised overall, for injury and self-harm, and die prematurely. Compared to children looked after at home, children looked after away from home had less absenteeism, less exclusion, less unemployment, and better attainment. Therefore, amongst those in care, being cared for away from home appeared to be a protective factor resulting in better educational outcomes. ConclusionsLooked-after-children had poorer health and educational outcomes than peers independent of increased neurodevelopmental conditions and special educational need. Further work is required to understand whether poorer outcomes relate to reasons for entering care, including maltreatment and adverse childhood events, neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities, or characteristics of the care system.

Teichman notes in her study of illegitimacy that “the point of the legitimate/illegitimate distinction is not to cause suffering; rather, it has to do with certain widespread human aims connected with the regulation of sexual activities and of population” (4). She also writes that, until relatively recently, “the shame of being an unmarried mother was the worst possible shame a woman could suffer” (119). Hence the secrecy, silences, and lies that used to be so common around the issue of an illegitimate birth and adoption.I was adopted at birth in the mid-1960s in New Zealand because my mother was a long way from family in England and had no support. She and my father had fallen in love, and planned to marry, but it all fell apart, and my mother was left with decisions to make. It was indeed a difficult time for unwed mothers, and that issue of shame and respectability was in force. The couple who adopted me were in their late forties and had been married for twenty-five years. My adoptive father had served in World War Two in the Royal Air Force before being invalided out for health problems associated with physical and psychological injuries. He was working in the same organisation as my mother and approached her when he learned of her situation. My adoptive mother loved England as her Home all of her life, despite living in Australia permanently from 1974 until her death in 2001. I did not know of my adoption until 1988, when I was twenty-three years old. The reasons for this were at least partly to do with my adoptive parents’ fear that I would leave them to search for my birth parents. My feelings about this long-held secret are complex and mixed. My adoptive mother never once mentioned my adoption, not on the day I was told by my adoptive father, nor at any point afterwards. My adoptive father only mentioned it again in the last two years of his life, after a long estrangement from me, and it made him weep. Even in the nursing home he did not want me to tell anyone that I had been adopted. It was impossible for me to obey this request, for my sense of self and my own identity, and for the recognition of the years of pain that I had endured as his daughter. He wanted to keep so much a secret; I could not, and would not, hold anything back anymore.And so I found myself telling anyone who would listen that I was adopted, and had only found out as an adult. This did not transmogrify into actively seeking out my birth parents, at least not immediately. It took some years before I obtained my original birth certificate, and then a long while again before I searched for, and found, my birth mother. It was not until my adoptive mother died that I launched into the search, probably because I did not want to cause her pain, though I did not consciously think of it that way. I did not tell my adoptive father of the search or the discovery. This was not an easy decision, as my birth mother would have liked to see him again and thank him, but I knew that his feelings were quite different and I did not want to risk further hurt to either my birth mother or my adoptive father. My own pain endures.I also found myself writing about my family. Other late discovery adoptees, as we are known, have written of their experiences, but not many. Maureen Watson records her shock at being told by her estranged husband when she was 40 years old; Judith Lucy, the comedian, was told in her mid-twenties by her sister-in-law after a tumultuous Christmas day; the Canadian author Wayson Choy was in his late fifties when he received a mysterious phone call from a woman about seeing his “other” mother on the street.I started with fiction, making up fairy tales or science fiction scenarios, or one act plays, or poetry, or short stories. I filled notebooks with these words of confusion and anger and wonder. Eventually, I realised I needed to write about my adoptive life in fuller form, and in life story mode. The secrecy and silences that had dominated my family life needed to be written out on the page and given voice and legitimacy by me. For years I had thought my father’s mental disturbance and destructive behaviour was my fault, as he often told me it was, and I was an only child isolated from other family and other people generally. My adoptive mother seemed to take the role of the shadow in the background, only occasionally stepping forward to curb my father’s disturbing and paranoid reactions to life.The distinction between legitimacy and illegitimacy may not have been created and enforced to cause suffering, but that, of course, is what it did for many caught in its circle of grief and exclusion. For me, I did not feel the direct effect of being illegitimate at birth, because I did not “know”. (What gathered in my unconscious over the years was another thing altogether.) This was different for my birth mother, who suffered greatly during the time she was pregnant, hoping something would happen that would enable her to keep me, but finally having to give me up. She does not speak of shame, only heartache. My adoptive father, however, felt the shame of having to adopt a child; I know this because he told me in his own words at the end of his life. Although I did not know of my adoption until I was an adult, I picked up his fear of my inadequacy for many years beforehand. I realise now that he feared that I was “soiled” or “tainted”, that the behaviour of my mother would be revisited in me, and that I needed to be monitored. He read my letters, opened my diaries, controlled my phone calls, and told me he had spies watching me when I was out of his range. I read in Teichman’s work that the word “bastard”, the colloquial term for an illegitimate child or person, comes from the Old French ba(s)t meaning baggage or luggage or pack-saddle, something that could be slept on by the traveller (1). Being illegitimate could feel like carrying heavy baggage, but someone else’s, not yours. And being adopted was supposed to render you legitimate by giving you the name of a father. For me, it added even more heavy baggage. Writing is one way of casting it off, refusing it, chipping it away, reducing its power. The secrecy of my adoption can be broken open. I can shout out the silence of all those years.The first chapter of the memoir, “A Shark in the Garden”, has the title “Revelation”, and concerns the day I learned of my adoptive status. RevelationI sat on my bed, formed fists in my lap, got up again. In the mirror there was my reflection, but all I saw was fear. I sat down, thought of what I was going to say, stood again. If I didn’t force myself out through my bedroom door, all would be lost. I had rung the student quarters at the hospital, there was a room ready. I had spoken to Dr P. It was time for me to go. The words were formed in my mouth, I had only to speak them. Three days before, I had come home to find my father in a state of heightened anxiety, asking me where the hell I had been. He’d rung my friend C because I had told him, falsely, that I would be going over to her place for a fitting of the bridesmaid dresses. I lied to him because the other bridesmaid was someone he disliked intensely, and did not approve of me seeing her. I had to tell him the true identity of the other bridesmaid, which of course meant that I’d lied twice, that I’d lied for a prolonged period of time. My father accused me of abusing my mother’s good nature because she was helping me make my bridesmaid’s dress. I was not a good seamstress, whereas my mother made most of her clothes, and ours, so in reality she was the one making the dress. When you’ve lied to your parents it is difficult to maintain the high ground, or any ground at all. But I did try to tell him that if he didn’t dislike so many of my friends, I wouldn’t have to lie to him in order to shield them and have a life outside home. If I knew that he wasn’t going to blaspheme the other bridesmaid every time I said her name, then I could have been upfront. What resulted was a dark silence. I was completing a supplementary exam in obstetrics and gynaecology. Once passed, I would graduate with a Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery degree, and be able to work as an intern in a hospital. I hated obstetrics and gynaecology. It was about bodies like my own and their special functions, and seemed like an invasion of privacy. Women were set apart as specimens, as flawed creatures, as beings whose wombs were always going wrong, a difficult separate species. Men were the predominant teachers of wisdom about these bodies, and I found this repugnant. One obstetrician in a regional hospital asked my friend and me once if we had regular Pap smears, and if our menstrual blood contained clots. We answered him, but it was none of his business, and I wished I hadn’t. I can see him now, the small eyes, the bitchiness about other doctors, the smarminess. But somehow I had to get through it. I had to get up each morning and go into the hospital and do the ward rounds and see patients. I had to study the books. I had to pass that exam. It had become something other than just an exam to me. It was an enemy against which I must fight.My friend C was getting married on the 19th of December, and somehow I had to negotiate my father as well. He sometimes threatened to confiscate the keys to the car, so that I couldn’t use it. But he couldn’t do that now, because I had to get to the hospital, and it was too far away by public transport. Every morning I woke up and wondered what mood my father would be in, and whether it would have something to do with me. Was I the good daughter today, or the bad one? This happened every day. It was worse because of the fight over the wedding. It was a relief to close my bedroom door at night and be alone, away from him. But my mother too. I felt as if I was betraying her, by not being cooperative with my father. It would have been easier to have done everything he said, and keep the household peaceful. But the cost of doing that would have been much higher: I would have given my life over to him, and disappeared as a person.I could wake up and forget for a few seconds where I was and what had happened the day before. But then I remembered and the fear exploded in my stomach. I lived in dread of what my father would say, and in dread of his silence.That morning I woke up and instantly thought of what I had to do. After the last fight, I realised I did not want to live with such pain and fear anymore. I did not want to cause it, or to live with it, or to kill myself, or to subsume my spirit in the pathology of my father’s thinking. I wanted to live.Now I knew I had to walk into the living room and speak those words to my parents.My mother was sitting in her spot, at one end of the speckled and striped grey and brown sofa, doing a crossword. My father was in his armchair, head on his hand. I walked around the end of the sofa and stood by ‘my’ armchair next to my mother.“Mum and Dad, I need to talk with you about something.”I sat down as I said this, and looked at each of them in turn. Their faces were mildly expectant, my father’s with a dark edge.“I know we haven’t been getting on very well lately, and I think it might be best if I leave home and go to live in the students’ quarters at the hospital. I’m twenty-three now. I think it might be good for us to spend some time apart.” This sounded too brusque, but I’d said it. It was out in the atmosphere, and I could only wait. And whatever they said, I was going. I was leaving. My father kept looking at me for a moment, then straightened in his chair, and cleared his throat.“You sound as if you’ve worked this all out. Well, I have something to say. I suppose you know you were adopted.”There was an enormous movement in my head. Adopted. I suppose you know you were adopted. Age of my parents at my birth: 47 and 48. How long have you and Dad been married, Mum? Oooh, that’s a tricky one. School principal’s wife, eyes flicking from me to Mum and back again, You don’t look much like each other, do you? People referring to me as my Mum’s friend, not her daughter. I must have got that trait from you Oh no I know where you got that from. My father not wanting me to marry or have children. Not wanting me to go back to England. Moving from place to place. No contact with relatives. This all came to me in a flash of memory, a psychological click and shift that I was certain was audible outside my mind. I did not move, and I did not speak. My father continued. He was talking about my biological mother. The woman who, until a few seconds before, I had not known existed.“We were walking on the beach one day with you, and she came towards us. She didn’t look one way or another, just kept her eyes straight ahead. Didn’t acknowledge us, or you. She said not to tell you about your adoption unless you fell in with a bad lot.”I cannot remember what else my father said. At one point my mother said to me, “You aren’t going to leave before Christmas are you?”All of her hopes and desires were in that question. I was not a good daughter, and yet I knew that I was breaking her heart by leaving. And before Christmas too. Even a bad daughter is better than no daughter at all. And there nearly was no daughter at all. I suppose you know you were adopted.But did my mother understand nothing of the turmoil that lived within me? Did it really not matter to her that I was leaving, as long as I didn’t do it before Christmas? Did she understand why I was leaving, did she even want to know? Did she understand more than I knew? I did not ask any of these questions. Instead, at some point I got out of the chair and walked into my bedroom and pulled out the suitcase I had already packed the night before. I threw other things into other bags. I called for a taxi, in a voice supernaturally calm. When the taxi came, I humped the suitcase down the stairs and out of the garage and into the boot, then went back upstairs and got the other bags and humped them down as well. And while I did this, I was shouting at my father and he was shouting at me. I seem to remember seeing him out of the corner of my eye, following me down the stairs, then back up again. Following me to my bedroom door, then down the stairs to the taxi. But I don’t think he went out that far. I don’t remember what my mother was doing.The only words I remember my father saying at the end are, “You’ll end up in the gutter.”The only words I remember saying are, “At least I’ll get out of this poisonous household.”And then the taxi was at the hospital, and I was in a room, high up in a nondescript, grey and brown building. I unpacked some of my stuff, put my clothes in the narrow wardrobe, my shoes in a line on the floor, my books on the desk. I imagine I took out my toothbrush and lotions and hairbrush and put them on the bedside table. I have no idea what the weather was like, except that it wasn’t raining. The faces of the taxi driver, of the woman in reception at the students’ quarters, of anyone else I saw that day, are a blur. The room is not difficult to remember as it was a rectangular shape with a window at one end. I stood at that window and looked out onto other hospital buildings, and the figures of people walking below. That night I lay in the bed and let the waves of relief ripple over me. My parents were not there, sitting in the next room, speaking in low voices about how bad I was. I was not going to wake up and brace myself for my father’s opprobrium, or feel guilty for letting my mother down. Not right then, and not the next morning. The guilt and the self-loathing were, at that moment, banished, frozen, held-in-time. The knowledge of my adoption was also held-in-time: I couldn’t deal with it in any real way, and would not for a long time. I pushed it to the back of my mind, put it away in a compartment. I was suddenly free, and floating in the novelty of it.ReferencesChoy, Wayson. Paper Shadows: A Chinatown Childhood. Ringwood: Penguin, 2000.Lucy, Judith. The Lucy Family Alphabet. Camberwell: Penguin, 2008.Teichman, Jenny. Illegitimacy: An Examination of Bastardy. New York: Cornell University Press, 1982. Watson, Maureen. Surviving Secrets. Short-Stop Press, 2010.