THE INCREASES in CAO points across many courses reflect the economic trends in science, engineering and technology, third-level sector chiefs said last night.
Areas such as computer science, which struggled to attract students during the economic boom, have seen significant increases in points, despite the number of student places rising.
Agriculture, which has become another degree area closely aligned with the performing sector of the economy, has also witnessed increases in CAO points across third-level institutions.
The acting deputy president of University College Dublin, Prof Mark Rogers, said the demand for science, engineering and agriculture courses “reflect the career focus of many students”.
Provost of Trinity College Dublin, Dr Patrick Prendergast, said the increasing demand for courses was in line with areas identified by the Government for growth and development.
There is growing demand for courses in engineering, mathematics and science, in which points for courses have risen overall, Dr Prendergast said.
In TCD, computer science has risen by 30 points to 385 points; business and computing has increased by 45 points to 420 points; and the general-entry science programme has increased by 15 points to 475 points.
President of Dublin City University, Prof Brian MacCraith, said its internal figures showed the university’s student numbers would be “significantly up” after a major recruitment campaign last year.
“We are very pleased with the emerging figures,” he said.
NUI Maynooth has already experienced the highest growth in CAO first-choice applications of any university in Ireland and is now set to welcome 2,000 new undergraduate students.
The university’s president, Prof Philip Nolan, said growth was strongest in the sciences and arts, indicating that students are “thinking ahead to possible career opportunities at an earlier stage”.
Individual subjects such as psychology (505 points), media studies (455 points) and science education (470 points) all experienced strong demand growth.
The university’s BSc in pharmaceutical and biomedical chemistry saw an increase from 365 points to 400.
Increased interest in sport and exercise sciences among students was reflected in University of Limerick, where a course in it rose by 30 points to 455 points.
State-wide trends were also evident in University College Cork, where computer science increased by 15 points to 330 points and biological and chemical sciences increased by 25 points to 400 points.
Similarly, NUI Galway’s computer science and information technology course increased by 65 points to 390 points, in line with overall trends.
Under the “second-chance” scheme in Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT), students will be given another opportunity at the end of August to sit the equivalent of the Leaving Cert mathematics paper, if they failed to achieve the grades needed for their courses.
Dr Derek O’Byrne, registrar with WIT, said students must have already achieved the cut-off points for their programme of choice.
As Dublin Institute of Technology prepares to move to a multimillion-euro campus in Grangegorman, many of its courses are less in demand and have fallen in points. Manufacturing and design engineering has fallen by 100 points, while planning and environmental management has fallen by 45 points.
However, the institute has seen increases in demand for electrical and electronic engineering and options such as physics with medical physics and bioengineering.