"SLIGO," exclaimed the father on the phone. "Sli-go?" the pitch of his voice rising in incredulity that anyone would venture to such foreign fields to g& a college place.
"And there are also vacancies in Limerick and Letterkenny RTCs," we ventured. "Letterkenny?" he screeched, by now totally flabbergasted at the lengths to which some desperate applicants would go.
A big part of the reason for places remaining vacant in RTCs, it seems to this column, is that Dubliners are simply reluctant to travel to provincial centres. Students living around the country are much more enterprising when it comes to moving away from home in order to get a college place, but Dublin students just want to stay at home.
This puts Dubliners at a huge disadvantage and, perhaps not surprisingly, a Higher Education Authority (HEA) study showed 58 per cent of west of Ireland Leaving Cert students getting into college, but only 48 per cent of the Dublin equivalent.
The paradox is that, almost without exception, points are high for courses in Dublin. Numerous callers ask about possible vacancies in the DIT or Tallaght RTC, for example, yet there is not the remotest likelihood of any such vacancies arising.
Meanwhile, courses in Sligo, Dundalk, Limerick and Letterkenny RTCs - and possibly a few others to come - are taking late applications and reapplications for vacancies.
Dublin students and their families will have to wake up to the reality that points are generally lower outside Dublin because of the large concentration of youth population in the Dublin area and the inevitable attraction of the capital for applicants.
There are hardly any courses available in the CAO system in Dublin on fewer than 300 points. There are a few, such as diet cookery or meat marketing, in the DIT in the 200 points range. But that is it.
Meanwhile, throughout the RTC system there is a vast range of courses in business, marketing, languages, engineering, computing and science available in the 200 points range, and down even to 130-150 points in some cases.
Quality and standards of courses have nothing to do with it. Tallaght, for example, is the newest and least experienced of the RTCs and, therefore, one might have thought, at a disadvantage compared to more established colleges. Yet, it takes 330 points to get into an ordinary two year computing certificate in Tallaght RTC, whereas 325 points will get you into Waterford RTC's top class applied computing degree.
Why should it be harder to get into a mere certificate course in Dublin than into a high powered degree course in Waterford? And, if the situation were reversed, what is the betting that a computing degree in Tallaght RTC would be up there around 400 points?
As things stand, students from the west and south west have a much higher success rate at getting in to college than Dublin students. If the Dubliners are to catch up, they simply have to get over their phobia about going outside the Pale and start taking college places in places like Sligo, Dundalk and Athlone.
If you do hold an offer for such a place outside of Dublin, the deadline for acceptance is tomorrow at 5:15 pm. Think about it.
. THE PLC ROUTE
IT SEEMS quite clear to us on this column that it is not that there is a bias against RTCs as such among Dublin applicants, simply a bias against going outside of Dublin. Thus, for example, demand for places in the big PLC colleges such as Ballyfermot Senior College, Colaiste Dhulaigh and others seems to be just as strong as in previous years.
We have had quite a number of callers who have RTC places on offer outside of Dublin but are opting for Ballyfermot PLC courses instead. We have spoken to applicants who have got themselves into quite convoluted situations as a result.
One student was going to accept a PLC place in business/ languages in Dublin because it provided the opportunity of transfer to a reserved RTC place next year.
"But," we pointed out, "you can already get into an RTC course in business/languages in Sligo RTC this year. You don't have to wait until next year." Guess what? She didn't want to go to Sligo. Her hopes were that she might get into Tallaght RTC or the DIT next year.
It seems that this whole business of the provision of places outside/inside Dublin needs to be looked at. A HEA committee recommended an RTC for Blanchardstown, but we've heard nothing further about this. Is it going to be provided?
Meanwhile, with no HEA recommendation at all, Castlebar gets an outreach campus from Galway RTC - a campus which has also failed, this year, to fill all its places. And what about Carlow RTC, which has, without either HEA or Department of Education authorisation, put outreach courses into Kilkenny and Wexford this year?
(It's not clear exactly how many students applied for those, but it seems extremely suspicious to Points Race that all six of those courses are registering 110 points; six courses all with the same cut off points - or could it just be a convenient figment of someone's imagination?)
At the same time, you have a thriving college like Ballyfermot Senior College in Dublin that cannot get an official State validation for its two and three year courses, and has to have them validated through the British BTEC system. If a two year outreach course in Wexford can get full NCEA (National Council for Educational Awards) validation, why can even a three year course in Ballyfermot Senior College not qualify to be even considered for the same?
Isn't it time some Dublin politicians began to take the same interest in these matters as their provincial counterparts do?
. CAO/CAS ACCEPTANCES
TODAY is certainly the last day for posting acceptances of Round One offers, though they could still be delivered personally at the CAO offices in Galway tomorrow.
Readers have been concerned as to whether accepting a Round One offer has any effect on their chances in subsequent rounds. No; whether you accept or reject a Round One offer, you will still be offered a higher preference if you become eligible for it in the second round.
But it is important to remember that once offered, say, your first preference from either list, you will not be offered anything else. Applicants can always travel upwards in their list of choices in the CAO system, but not downwards; so if you have been offered your fourth preference, you're still in the running for your first, second and third, but not for anything below fourth.
In the case of students who send back two acceptances - degree and diploma the latest one to arrive in the CAO office is the one which will be registered; you can't accept two offers.
. ROUND TWO
PERHAPS too many applicants are pinning their hopes on the second round of offers, particularly those who have the points but are caught on random selection. In most cases, the colleges have quite a number of students on the random selection waiting list - if it were only a small number they would have made the extra effort to offer to everyone.
So there is no certainty at all that anyone caught on random selection will get an offer in Round Two - regularly, there are courses which make no offers at all on Round Two.
Don't expect any sizeable drop in points, either, with the high number of offers made in Round One. It is unlikely there will be that much movement in Round Two.
. SURGEONS
THE College of Surgeons began offering as promised on Friday, they will continue a "rolling series of offers as acceptances come in. The college cannot disclose any points, they tell us, and they would only say that the points are in line with those in the other medical schools.
Surgeons do, of course, also take the interview into account when allocating places, not to mention offering a quota of places from their own entrance exam.
Perhaps, like the art and design courses, they could start issuing us with points for interview performance and exam results? We presume they do have some means of quantifying performance at the interview?