Two Leaving Cert students at Carrick-on-Suir's Edmund Rice Secondary School look ahead to the future

Adam Keane and Liam Eachthigheirn, students at Carrick-on-Suir's Edmund Rice Secondary School,  started their Leaving Cert exams this week alongside their classmates and have ambitions to pursue very different fields of study and careers – one in furniture making and the other in astrophysics.

Adam is hoping to get enough points to study physics in University College Cork. He has studied both physics and applied maths for the Leaving Cert with the aim of getting into this degree course.

He says he likes physics because it’s really interesting to see how everything works.

“I am interested in the space and astronomy side of it. Astrophysics is what I want to do in UCC. I have a telescope at home and during the Covid-19 lockdowns I watched videos online and podcasts on the subject.”

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In contrast, Liam has a passion for woodwork and crafted this beautiful games table for his Leaving Cert practical project in the subject.

He is very proud of the finished table, the design of which he adapted from one he found online.

“I like building stuff, joining the pieces of wood together and varnishing. I am planning to go to Letterfrack (Atlantic Technological University, Connemara) to do a course in furniture manufacture and design. The course includes a year studying abroad.”

Adam, Liam and their fellow Leaving Cert students at Edmund Rice Secondary School visited a range of universities and other third level colleges over the past few months to assist them with choosing the right course and career for them.