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H1s and H2s galore for Virginia College students

Kevin MacDermott

At Virginia College


A steady stream of students arrived during the morning to Virginia College to collect the much anticipated Leaving Cert results. Staff at the school had arranged the official envelopes in four piles just inside the office so that students wouldn't have to wait too long to get their hands on it. A small number of graduates arrived ahead of the 10am deadline and sat in groups of two and three, not so much nervous as impatient to get their hands on the brown envelope.

Brave souls like Maria Broletti and Karl Golden tore open their results there and then. Maria's impressive tally of 555 will see her puruse psychology in Stirling University in Scotland, while Karl's 565 points has opened the doors of DCU.

Many of the students decided to wait until home, or at least in the sanctuary of the car, before sneaking a peek at the results and then working out the points they had achieved. For some the joy was simply in passing a subject that they were concerned about, for others it became a waiting game to see what offers are made in the CAO first round.

A phone app proved helpful to Cian O'Kelly and Liam Maguire (pictured) in calculating their points to see will they get into St Pat's College DCU, to study teaching.
Principal Karen Fitzpatrick was on hand to offer congratulations and encouragement to students; for her it was her last formal day in the school. After eleven years as head she is moving on to take up a role as deputy principal in Cavan Institute. Karen was pleased with the results achieved by the class of 2017.

“We have a high percentage of students who achieved, H1s and H2s in a range of subject areas. We are particularly proud of results in subject areas such as biology, music, french, maths, history, Engineering and Irish where students achieved a high proportion of H1s and H2's this year. Thirty three per cent took the higher level maths paper and many benefitted from the extra 25 points.â€