When you log on to the State Examinations Commissions (SEC) portal this morning to discover what Leaving Cert grades you have been awarded, you will be full of excitement and anticipation.
After years at second level, you are about to discover the fruits of your labour. Stay calm and ensure that you are clear about how to interpret the grades in front of you as they relate to college-entry requirements, for the CAO in Ireland, European universities or UCAS courses in Northern Ireland and Britain.
If it is CAO points you are counting, you are only likely to do this exercise once in a lifetime, and it is easy to get it wrong and cause yourself and your parents unnecessary anxiety. So, take a few minutes to carefully determine your score. You should have a points chart to hand, and sites such as irishtimes.com/education and careersportal.ie have features to enable you to enter your grades and receive a CAO points calculation.
No matter the outcome, it is worth remembering that success comes in many forms. For one student, a score of 560 points may be devastating in terms of studying veterinary medicine at UCD; for another, 250 points may represent a huge achievement. Remember, you count the best six scores you have achieved across all subjects.
RM Block
If you did the Leaving Certificate Vocational Programme (LCVP) and your score for the module is better than your lowest of the six scores, you can include the LCVP instead. If you got at least a H6 in higher-level maths, you add 25 to the normal points score attached to the grade you achieved.
There are some slight variations in how points are calculated by some third-level colleges, and all such variations are clearly outlined in the CAO handbook. It is available online at www.cao.ie.
Will my CAO points score secure me my desired courses?
There is a widespread misperception among the public and many students that points are determined by the colleges and that you aim to reach that target over the two years of your Leaving Cert studies. The UCAS system in the UK works on that basis; if you meet the target grades that the college or course director in question set you, then you secure your place.
Before the Covid-19 pandemic, the CAO points required to secure the last place offered the previous year was usually a good indicator of whether your hopes would turn into a CAO offer. For the past five years, students taking higher-level papers under the revised arrangements, including grades adjustments, secured far higher marks than the 2019 or previous years’ classes. How this year’s points requirements will play out will not be known until next Wednesday, when the CAO releases its offers.
Is the process fair to all college applicants?
In truth, the answer is “NO”.
To escape from the consequences of the enhanced grades necessitated by the way the Leaving Cert classes of 2020 and 2021 were awarded grades, then minister for education Norma Foley was forced to bake in enhanced grades averaging 7 per cent higher in 2022-2024.
Deciding to unwind this 7 per cent enhancement over four to five years means that this year’s Leaving Cert graduates will have on average 1.5 per cent less of an enhancement of their originally marked scripts than those secured by students from 2021-2024.
This process will now be baked in for the next three to four years, affecting the Leaving Cert classes of 2026, 2027 and 2028 at a minimum.
Minister for Higher Education James Lawless has tried to soften this blow by funding additional places in high-demand courses that traditionally require very high points, predominantly in the medical and paramedical courses.
But there will be students who receive their Leaving Cert results this year who will miss out on a CAO offer in a course to an applicant who secured the same initial grades as them, following the marking of scripts process, but who are carrying a 7 per cent enhancement as opposed to their 5.5 per cent one.
Was there an alternative way of returning to a non-enhanced grading process?
Yes, but it would require co-operation and a rule change from the universities who operate the CAO application process.
Round one of the CAO offers, which takes place next Wednesday, predominantly applies to those under 23 years of age on January 1st last. The Leaving Cert has been corrected in the normal way by teachers since 2022, before the enhancement process of their original grades to ensure that they were not at a disadvantage to those who secured enhanced grades in 2020 and 2021, through calculated grades awarded by the students’ relevant subject teachers. This process resulted in 68 per cent of grades being enhanced in 2024. Those pre-enhanced grades are recorded in the State Examinations Commission IT system.
Without in any way attempting to change a student’s 2022-2024 Leaving Cert award, it should have been possible to devise an application rule change removing the entire enhancement process from any applicant from the 2022 Leaving Cert class and subsequent years who sought a CAO place from 2025 onwards.
If this had been done, then we could have discontinued the enhancement process entirely and allowed those holding Leaving Certs from 2022 onwards including the current year to compete for CAO places on an absolutely equal footing.
There are alternatives to the CAO worth considering?
Ireland has a growing system of further education and training (FET), consisting of an extensive range of post- Leaving Cert (PLC) courses along with enhanced and expanding apprenticeship programmes where ongoing training and part-time study are built into the job.
These routes from school to further education (FE) provide many opportunities for the tens of thousands of young learners who wish to develop their abilities and skills in a way that is best suited to them. Indeed, many courses lead to a third-level qualification.
For a significant cohort of those leaving secondary schools each year, the option of studying for a QQI level-five or six award at the local FE college or starting an apprenticeship, which mixes working in employment alongside study, is by far the most appropriate choice, even if a CAO place happens to be available to them.
Further education courses are provided in Education and Training Board colleges throughout the country. Courses are designed to consolidate the learning of those who excel in disciplines ranging from IT and science to business and art.
Up to 20 per cent of places in courses with the highest CAO points are reserved for graduates of FE courses each year and see applicants securing places and thriving in those courses, even though 12 months previously they might have been hundreds of CAO points short of the required entry score.
Other FE courses are designed to prepare students to enter directly into high-quality employment, in vocational/employment-focused courses such as pre-Garda/pre-paramedic, childcare, hairdressing, animal healthcare, etc, immediately on completion of their one or two-year programmes.
More information on CAO-linked PLC/FE courses is available from www.careersportal.ie, while details of every PLC/FE course in the country are available through the qualifax.ie website.
Tertiary Degree Offerings
In 2023, the then minister and now Taoiseach Simon Harris launched a new initiative in which applicants can apply for one of a wide range of degree programmes which are still available up to this September, in which students will start year one and, in some cases, the second year of their degree in their local further education college, and then move on to a university to complete the qualification.
The key difference to the previous FE model is that progression is guaranteed from day one, once exams are successfully completed along the way. Applications are still open for these 30-plus programmes. Details at www.nto.ie.
