If you did not receive a satisfactory course offer in yesterday's second round of the CAO application process, your options in the current academic year may now be narrowing considerably. However, there are still courses and alternate options available to you. The list of those available will continue to be published on the CAO website cao.ie over the coming weeks.
Place any of the “Available Places Courses” on to your application record and you may receive an offer of a place on that programme in the weeks ahead.
This evening thousands of this year's Leaving Certificate students will review one or a number of their scripts at their schools. This process will continue all day tomorrow as well. Students who have applied to view scripts may bring a second person, normally a subject teacher or parent, with them.
If you discover an administrative error in the totalling of the marks on the front page of your answer sheet by the correcting teacher, bring this matter to the attention of the supervising teacher. Such administrative errors are rectified by the SEC and communicated to the CAO, without having to seek a remarking of your script.
If, having viewed your script, you decide to seek a remarking of one or more of your papers, you must submit it to the SEC by 5.30 pm by next Wednesday, September 3rd. The fee for a standard Leaving Certificate subject, refundable in the case of a successful appeal, is €40. The fees are payable by bank giro form provided by the SEC, through any bank or by credit card over the internet. You will get this giro form in your school.
The SEC says many candidates return their appeal form without proof of payment – either the stamped personalised bank giro, if paid at the bank, or the internet confirmation record if paid online by credit card. Such incomplete applications can invalidate the appeal request. If the recheck leads to a higher grade, the payment will be refunded.
If you were offered a CAO place yesterday, you have a week to consider whether you wish to accept or reject the place. Any places not accepted by the September 3rd deadline will continue to be offered by the CAO to applicants over the coming six weeks. Students who receive upgraded Leaving Cert marks will receive revised offers following the publication of those results in mid-October.
When the SEC publishes the amended Leaving Cert results in October, the CAO will make offers to all applicants who would have secured a higher ranking offer if they had had those points on August 18th.
Most students who wish to accept such higher-choice offers will probably have to defer these places, as half of semester one lectures will have passed by that stage. The acceptance of CAO places by more than 40,000 applicants, who had also applied for PLC programmes, has freed up opportunities in this sector, providing opportunities to progress if you failed to secure a satisfactory offer in your area of interest through the CAO.
Many of these courses link back into level 8 and 7/6 courses in the CAO, which you can apply for in January next year, using your QQI Further Education and Training Award Council (Fetac) award as your entry qualification. Alternatively, some PLC programmes offer direct entry to excellent employment opportunities, so check out the courses available in your locality on qualifax.ie
What do you do if you have secured only one grade C at higher level and want to matriculate?
You have three options. You may repeat the entire Leaving Cert to secure two Cs at higher level, a higher points score and reapply to the CAO next year. You can repeat one or more subjects to secure a second higher C grade, but you cannot increase your points score this way, or you can use your existing Leaving Cert result to seek a PLC course and progress back into a level 8 course through that route.
Student Universal Support Ireland (Susi) has received over 96,000 applications for the 2014-2015 academic year, to date. All new applications, submitted before the August 1st deadline will have been initially assessed by the middle of next week. Susi will then move to the next phase of the process, which is to review the documentation provided by applicants.
It is at that stage that Susi will be in a position to finalise the applications of those students who have returned their requested documentation. Processing priority will be given to those students who returned their requested documentation at the earliest dates.
Significant process and resource improvements made by Susi over the past 12 months have contributed to a much more enhanced and streamlined process for students. With the further improvements it has made for the new academic year, it is expected to continue to fulfil its important role of supporting students in accessing further/higher education.
As the class of 2014 leaves the second-level system and progresses into higher and further education, the school system gets back to full tilt next Monday – with more than 75,000 children entering primary schools and 60,000 transferring to second level.
