CollegeChoice/Brian Mooney:As students logged on to the CAO website yesterday morning, they saw the ongoing fall in points in many of the main courses offered by colleges.
The largest course in the State, Arts at UCD, continues its downward points requirement score, falling another five points this year to 345. Successful applicants are now making frantic efforts to secure accommodation in or near their new college. For others, the wait goes on to secure a place in a desired programme.
Many of those candidates called The Irish Timesadvice line yesterday once the offers of CAO places were released. Below are a range of topics raised by callers:
1. I have my heart set on studying medicine, but missed out by 15 points. I am aware that I could accept my next choice, science, and take my chances in applying for a postgraduate medical place following graduation, but I would prefer to study medicine immediately if that were possible. I have read about Irish students studying medicine in Budapest. Is that option still possible in the current year?
Hungarian state universities, which offer English language courses to Irish students, are holding a special examination this coming Friday at 9.30am at the Hungarian embassy in Dublin.
For those interested in studying degrees in the following disciplines - medicine, veterinary, physiotherapy, pharmacy or dentistry in Budapest, please contact Tim O'Leary, a veterinary surgeon in Cork who organises these programme, at (028) 37180.
Entrance is based on the results of this examination, which tests applicant's standards in chemistry and biology.
2. I did not receive any offer from the CAO, because my points were not high enough. Where can I repeat my Leaving Certificate?
There is no central registry of schools and colleges that run repeat Leaving Certificate programmes. Qualifax ( www.qualifax.ie) has a list of seven such schools and post- Leaving Cert colleges which offer this option to students. Any school offering the programme, who wishes to be added to the list on the Qualifax home page, should contact Tom Farrell on (059) 914 6436. The number of students participating in such programmes has fallen over the past 10 years from 9,000 in the mid 1990s to a little over 1,800 in the past year.
3. When I filled in my CAO application last January, I did not tick the disability box out of embarrassment and a sense of not wanting to share the information about my condition with both the CAO itself and the admission officers and other staff in all the colleges listed on my CAO application.
Now that I have my Leaving Certificate result, I have fallen short by 15 points on the courses I have applied for. I now realise that I should have ticked the disability box on my application. Can I now rectify this situation?
The process of assessing any student's disability, based on the reports of educational psychologists and medical consultant's reports where appropriate, can take many months.
This is a very sensitive subject, as offering points requirement reductions to one applicant automatically denies a place on that course to another student who would otherwise have got the place.
Therefore, all colleges go to great lengths to ensure that they are transparently fair in their assessment of any such request for consideration of a disability.
You have two options. You can study the Vacant Places list on the CAO website to see if there is any course listed which might be of interest to you.
Alternatively, you can defer starting college for a year, apply to the CAO next January indicating that you have a disability and provide the college or colleges in question with the documentary proof of your disability.
This may or may not lead to points reduction in your requirements to enter your desired courses.
Finally, your reluctance to reveal your disability to the CAO and colleges is understandable. For those students who will face this dilemma in the coming year, let me assure you that both the CAO and colleges treat the matter of disability information with the greatest sensitivity and confidentiality.
Their goal is twofold. Firstly, to provide you, the applicant, with detailed information of the disability support services that the college offers, including issues of access and participation.
Secondly, to assess whether you should be offered any entry concessions, based on your disability. Ahead, the Association of Higher Education Access and Disability, provides students with comprehensive information and support in this field at www.aheadweb.org
4. I have failed to meet the entry requirement for my CAO course by one grade on my French paper. Now that Irish has been included among the languages recognised at EU level as a working language of the community, should it not therefore be acceptable to colleges, particularly the National University of Ireland, as a modern European language?
It would seem to me that as Irish has now been accepted as a working language of the community, it should have the status of a modern European language in the eyes of our colleges.
The fact that the number of students taking Irish at higher level has increased by 1,000 this year, is both an indication of the effect of the growing Gaelscoil movement and the enhanced employment opportunities that EU status will provide students with proficiency in Irish.
Advice podcast on www.ireland.com/education
The Irish Times advice helpline: 1-800-923-429
The Irish Times Helpline, is staffed again today until 10pm by qualified guidance counsellors, is free on 1-800-923-429.