Like thousands of other students currently sitting the Leaving Cert, Cain Hopkins, a 17-year-old from Dublin, spent a large portion of his final year at his desk, in front of a screen. "This room is the only place I would be.
My world shrunk," he told Prime Time in a video diary. His friends, his teachers – even his football team, Shamrock Rovers – were rendered pixelated objects on a desktop screen, his connection to the outside world.
Cain is one of three students who have been documenting their Leaving Cert on camera for Prime Time. In one of his video diaries, Cain explained that he had to share a room with his brother, which made studying for his Leaving Cert a challenge at times. "We were on top of each other.