As students get ready to attend this year’s Higher Options at the RDS in Dublin, many may be wondering what the experience might offer them. Or indeed how to get the information they need and want from an event laden with talks, stands and discussions about various course opportunities and educational institutions.
But fear not, because we are here to guide students through the things to consider as they explore all that Higher Options has to offer, and how that might translate into the course of studies they might choose to purse
Interest
“A student’s interest is their biggest motivator in terms of what they’re going to do after school,” says Niamh Dwyer, lead guidance counsellor at careersportals.ie. “They can have abilities across different areas, but it’s their interest that is really what will drive them to make the right choice”.
“It really needs to be driven by their own interests,” Dwyer says, rather than the interests of their parents or others. “It’s the young person. It’s their journey. And it’s really important that they’re following a pathway, and a journey that’s of interest to them.”
RM Block
It’s that same interest that should determine their course of study and not whether a student is likely to far exceed the points required for a preferred course, Dwyer explains. “We have to remember the points is a system that is totally based on supply and demand. And it doesn’t have anything to do with the interest.
“They need to think about what are the areas, the sectors that I might have an interest in. And then within those areas, are there any particular jobs that are attractive, or is it that I would like to do something in the general area?
“In attending an event like this, where you have so many options there, the biggest thing I would say to students is to keep an open mind. It’s early in the year now, and yes they will have to make decisions later in the year, but this is the ideal time to look at lots of different options.”
Choosing an educational path to follow, or what to put on their CAO list is the “first big decision” that students have to make for themselves Dwyer continues. “And they’re the only ones who can make it. So going to an event like this is a huge help because it may start the process off for some of them. For others, where they’ve already started their research, it may give them the opportunity to meet specific colleges that they have an interest in, or staff members or students from the various institutions to chat to them.”
Careers
Deciding whether an interest, hobby or passion can become a career “comes up a lot”, Dwyer says. “It can come up in areas like music or sport, for example, where people think: ‘Do I want to make what I love my career?’ That is a conversation that students need to kind of tease out themselves, first of all, but maybe chat to other people. It’s very, very difficult for a student of 16 or 17 or 18 to really know what they want to do.”
Dwyer says the advice she gives students is to remind them “they’re not choosing what they want to do for the rest of their lives. They’re choosing just the first step. And where that takes them. We know now, people change their careers several times during their working lives.
“For some students they have a strong feeling that there’s a particular job or career they’ve an interest in. For others, they won’t have a clue. So they’ll choose the course in an area that they have an interest in, that will open up lots of different opportunities for them as they move through it.”
We’ve so many different routes. People are constantly changing and building on their careers. They’re on their degree programmes and their training programmes and going off in different directions after them.”
Dwyer recommends young people think about themselves as a person. “I would include in that things like their skills, their personality, their values, what’s important to them, how they learn best, because people learn in different ways.”
“That’s the opportunity you get with Higher Options, is to look at all the different ways there are of getting to the destination that you want at the moment. And, as I say, that’s just the very start of their career.”
Location
In a time of rent crisis and rising expenses, a huge factor for students is “the cost” Dwyer says. “Over the years I have certainly seen a lot of students say: ‘I really can’t consider Dublin because it’s just too expensive.’ People do make choices around the financial element or the availability or non-availability of accommodation.
A student’s experience at school can also be a factor. “It can be a big move to go further away.” Tertiary degrees can be a great option here, Dwyer says “because they allow students to start their journey locally in a local ETB or in a college of further education, and then continue the degree in the higher-education institution that’s linked to that tertiary degree.
“Location is a factor. It’s a huge factor for some students. It’s less so for others. But definitely geography does influence student choices and I have found that over the years”.
Costs
In addition to accommodation costs there are other living costs, student contribution costs, technology costs and various expenses that students will need to consider when choosing a course of study. And as costs grow having a part-time job has become almost a given for many people, Dwyer says. Leading to the consideration of whether it is logistically possible to work part-time while pursuing this course of study.
“I think it’s very difficult for students not to be able to work part-time. Some students will get funding through Susi and other supports. But first of all, it’s usually not enough. And secondly, not every student gets that type of support. So you have families that are really under pressure. And therefore it’s fairly standard I would say that young people are working part-time. In fact, there are cases of some students that are working really long hours while also trying to maintain college life,” she says.
“There’s an extra pressure there academically, but secondly they’re missing out on that social aspect of college, which is such a big part of their development, in terms of societies and all that type of thing.
“There’s a huge amount of people that are travelling long distances. I’m living in Kerry and it would never have been thought before ... that people would have travelled up and down, for example, to Cork, or to Limerick. But that’s actually happening now because people can’t get accommodation and it’s too expensive. And you absolutely have that happening for a lot of the Dublin universities where you have people that are probably travelling two hours each way to get to college, which is really, really hard going.
Social side of college
At an event such as Higher Options, the social side of college is less likely to be a consideration for the school students in attendance, Dwyer says, but it is something they can ask about at college open days.
“It’s more likely to be a factor for them when they go to open days and they are on the campus of the college and they’re getting to see what clubs and societies there are,” she says.
“Most third-level institutions and further-education colleges now do have fairly string student unions. They have lots of clubs and societies. They’re across the board. They’re almost a given now, really. Even in the smaller colleges there’s a huge effort made on the part of the college to make sure that’s part of the experience.”
Higher Options 2026
Size of the college
This can be an important consideration for some students, including those “coming from smaller secondary schools, for example, or more rural areas,” Dwyer says. It can be very daunting to go into a campus where you have 20 000 students ... It isn’t that they can’t get used to it, they can. It just can be daunting to begin with.” This is where attending college open days can really help to give students a flavour of what college life there might be like.
“Higher Options is brilliant because it’s a kind of a one-stop shop for everything together. So that’s a great starting point”. Following on from that, Dwyer says, it’s “really important that they get to the open days” of the colleges and courses that have caught their attention and interest.
“There is a lot of supports there for students” in both the bigger and the smaller colleges, Dwyer says. It may be a case of needing to dig online to find this information for the bigger colleges and universities. But it is there, she says.
“There’s a skill for students in finding who that person is, or what that office is, or where they need to go to access whatever kind of support for information that they’re looking for.”
So how can students ask about these things at Higher Options?
First things first: please don’t be nervous or shy away from asking questions. The purpose of the event is to provide students with as much information and as many insights as possible, to help them decide what they might like to do after the Leaving Cert. Everyone there will want to help and there is no such thing as a silly question.
You can ask about colleges, courses and options at the various stalls throughout the venue over the course of the morning or afternoon sessions. There will also be a number of careers talks throughout the day, where a panel will share their insights and experiences from various perspectives. And at the end of each talk there’s an opportunity to put questions to our panel. And we really love questions at these sessions. Because your question not only helps you, but often many other students in the audience too.
So check your Higher Options planner and make sure to take note of the times of your preferred talks.
The Irish Times Higher Options 2026 takes place at the RDS Main Hall in Ballsbridge, Dublin, from Wednesday, September 16th to Friday, September 18th.
