To mark the release of the Leaving Cert results on Wednesday, we have a new four-part series looking at education called Level Up.
In the first part of the series, we discussed the teaching of languages in our secondary schools.
Kevin Williams, Senior Research Fellow at Dublin City University, said that the standard of languages among school leavers is "much higher than people assume", with a third of Leaving Cert results in Honours Irish and 40% of French results being either A, B or C grades.
However, he feels the problems often begin afterwards.
"Once you leave school, you're not going to have the reinforcement that you had in school. We just don't have the incentive to retain the language skills we have."
Aodhan O'Dea of Conradh Na Gaeilge explained why it's so important to learn languages.
"Languages give us a deeper understanding of the world, they enable us to get jobs in other countries. A better understanding of languages at a young age helps you with other subjects."
Aodhan also suggested some changes to the way Irish is taught, in order to encourage more students to embrace the language: "Starting at primary level, let's teach a second subject through Irish, such as PE - let's take it out of the classroom."
Irish Independent education editor Katharine Donnelly described the changes that are due to occur: "There will be two syllabi for Irish, one for whom Irish is their first language and the second for students whose standard of Irish isn't at that level. It will be up to the schools to decide which one they'll use."
Katharine sees the oral section of the Leaving Cert exam as a positive.
"Allowing 40% of the marks for oral Irish is promoting the communication side of the language, which seems to be a good way of encouraging people to learn it and to use it."
