Plans to cut back on Leaving Cert English and Maths exams will further fuel the anxiety epidemic among Irish children, Ciara Kelly has warned.

The Irish Times reports this morning that major changes to the Leaving Cert could see students sitting just one English exam, with a Fifth Year project instead counting towards 40% of their final results.

Meanwhile, plans to reduce to Maths to a single exam are also under discussion – but are at a less advanced stage.

The paper notes that the changes are aimed at easing the stress students face as they prepare for their final State exams.

Shane Coleman in the Newstalk studio. Image: Newstalk

On Newstalk Breakfast this morning, presenter Shane Coleman said he is “really worried” that the plan is further ‘dumbing down’ the Leaving Cert for today’s students.

“This isn't like the old man looking at this going, ‘It was harder in my day’ – but I actually don’t think the leaving Cert is of the same standard as it was 20 or 30 years ago,” he said.

“I really don't think it is.

“I see it with my kids with the history book; when I compare the history books that I had - you know, ‘Ireland since the famine’ and ‘Europe since Napoleon’ - they are really dense, heavy books with lots of analysis in there.

“I look at the history books for Leaving Cert today and they're full of illustrations and really short chapters and big writing.

“I do wonder, are we dumbing down the Leaving Cert?

“I worry that what we're doing with English and potentially Maths is a further dumbing down.”

Anxiety

Fellow presenter Ciara Kelly agreed and warned that, by aiming to ease student’s stress, we are failing to prepare them for life as adults.

She said her own son will be the first year to face the proposed changes to the exams.

“We're basically saying to him and to everyone who comes after him, ‘You're not able to do this double English paper that every other generation of Irish person has done since the Leaving Cert was pretty much designed,’” she said.

“You're not able to do this and we're going to make it easier for you because it's just a bit too stressful.

“Then we wonder and we scratch our heads about the fact that there is an absolute epidemic of anxiety among young people and we are not joining the dots between that and this.”

Resilience

Ciara said she believes resilience is “the key to combating anxiety”.

“You only worry about things you think you can't cope with,” she said. “If you are resilient, you think you can cope.

“How do you get resilience into people? You give them small age-appropriate challenges that they overcome.

“Then they realise that they can overcome things and then they grow in their abilities and in their confidence and in their resilience.

“It is the antidote to anxiety and instead, all we keep doing is trying to remove obstacles in this artificial way from them.”

'Bloody stupid'

She said the by protecting young people from adversity we are “literally sending kids out like lambs to the slaughter when they're older”.

“[They have] no resilience whatsoever, because we haven't actually allowed them, as the generation above them, to deal with adversity in an age-appropriate way,” she said.

“It's bloody stupid; we're actually stopping our kids from recognising their own capabilities.

“Why? I have no idea. I have no idea why we are doing this to them, but it's a stupid plan.

“We should be allowing kids to do what they're able to do, like every other generation before them.”

If approved, the changes to Leaving Cert English could come into force for students entering Fifth Year in September 2026.