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Minister of State McHugh welcomes the Leaving Cert Irish results

Minister of State for Gaeltacht Affairs, Joe McHugh T.D., has welcomed the Leaving Cert Irish results which were published yesterday (13 August). The Minister of State said that the current state of the Irish language in the education system, as evidenced by these results, was very hopeful. The Minister of State welcomed in particular the high number of students, 45,268, who took Irish as an exam subject this year. This is an increase of 5.3% on the numbers who sat the exam in 2012. There was a significant increase of 13.7% during the same period in the number of students who undertook the higher level course. Of the 18,134 students who sat the exam at higher level, 88.8% achieved a Grade C or higher.

The Minister of State said that he was delighted to see that very healthy results had been achieved overall and that the effects of the policy changes implemented by the Department of Education and Skills in recent years are now to be seen. “As a result of these changes, more emphasis is being placed on oral Irish and this will help with the acquisition and progress of the language,” he said.

The Minister of State congratulated all the students who took Irish in the Leaving Cert and said that he hoped they would avail of every opportunity to use the language in the future. He said, "You now have a good understanding of our national language, having studied it over the last number of years and I am sure that you understand that Irish is a very valuable part of our heritage and of our Irish identity. Let us not forget the seanfhocal 'Beatha teanga í a labhairt.'