Combating banknote inflation – The Irish Times

Dear Sir, – I would welcome the Government's declaration of intention to reverse recent periods of grade inflation (and perhaps hyperinflation, when 'predicted grades' were necessary), but no solution can be entirely fair at this stage. This is a problem because, in my view, education is what Ireland has done 'best right' and also the factor from which our other significant strengths emerge, so if we compromise it, it is at our peril.

Obviously, efforts to lower the grades awarded will have a negative impact on that year's graduates, particularly if graduates from previous years are competing for the university places they want. Consideration should be given to informing all students of their national percentile rank based on their grades rather than their marks. Whether to include five or all subjects, or how to compare lower-level subjects with higher-level subjects, are operational decisions that could be debated. However, a useful and fair outcome would be if the results could be meaningfully compared and interpreted even decades later. If next year's results show that to get a place in a particular faculty a student must be in the top 20 percent, 5 percent, or even, say, 0.35 percent of the 60,000 or so who took the exam, then a fair assessment could be made using previous years' results. Concerns about grade inflation or reversal of these would be far less important.

Doctors who want to work in the US are assessed through lengthy multiple-choice tests where actual scores count much less than percentile. Scoring above certain thresholds, such as being in the top 15 percent, is often a requirement for applying to the most popular locations and hospitals. This allows for a fair comparison across geographic and time boundaries. -Sincerely, etc.

BRIAN O’BRIEN,

Kinsale,

County Cork.