A tight little group of girls from a north-west Dublin school were taking a break outside The Irish Times/Institute of Guidance Counsellors Higher Options Conference at the RDS. Kathryn Holmquist, Education Correspondent, reports.
"It's so busy you can hardly talk to anybody. Then, when you talk to them, they just tell you how wonderful their college is. The hard information is all in the books that they give you. Look at that scrum outside the UCD stand."
"Yea. . .rugby! But that man at the stand for Tallaght explained to you all about how you could do that course that other way, and you wouldn't have known that otherwise."
"That's true, and the admissions officer at that university was so nice. She gave me her phone number and everything, and said I could ring any time."
"So then, will we go into town shopping now?"
It was 11 a.m. and for these students the day had - so far - been worthwhile on evaluation.
In the RDS halls, admissions officers were swarmed by nearly 10,000 sixth years full of questions. Some were so well-informed that their questions were honed to fine points, while others still had no clue about what career they wanted.
Most popular choices this year seem to be psychology, law, veterinary, commerce and media. The 200 third-level institutions represented at the Higher Options conference were competing to give the best impression.
"We're selling the social life - although we're not supposed to call it that. We call it 'personal development'," confided the admissions officer at the stand for one major Irish university.
The clubs and societies are, indeed, a major selling point. UCC went to the trouble of publishing a newsletter outlining the social opportunities there.
Students from the Sacred Heart in Westport awoke at 5 a.m. yesterday to get the bus to Dublin.
Áine Gill, who wants to study law through arts at NUI Galway, said that spending the day at the RDS was helping her "to make a more informed choice".
Laura Seahill, from the same school, was delighted to discover she could do a beautician's course at her own pace in Dún Laoghaire, spending from one to three years getting her qualification.
The free ruler, handed out by Cork Institute of Technology, impressed Deirdre Mullowney, also from Westport, who had amassed an impressive collection of CD-roms from the various universities.
Deirdre wants to study veterinary, and spent a lot of time at the stands for the British colleges, which she found "approachable and helpful".