Maths exam results to be appealed in large numbers

As emotions settle after Tuesday's offers, students are beginning to take action on exam rechecks, with lower level maths grades…

As emotions settle after Tuesday's offers, students are beginning to take action on exam rechecks, with lower level maths grades likely to be appealed in large numbers.

The deadline for submitting requests to see exam scripts has passed and the Department of Education is strict about it.

However, if you missed the deadline you can still appeal your grades.

Viewing your script is solely there to help you make that decision.

READ MORE

If you want to appeal any grade you must have the application at your school by September 3rd or early on September 4th at the latest.

The schools send the applications to the Department of Education and an experienced examiner has a fresh look at the paper. You should know the result of the appeal in early October.

Some students are worried they will be marked down during the rechecking process. This is possible because rechecking involves an examiner marking the paper from scratch.

However, a Department of Education spokesman said fewer than five students are downgraded on average each year, mainly because the original examiner calculated the marking grades incorrectly, he added.

Nursing

Between 100 and 200 mature general nursing applicants will get offers this year after an administrative error was made by the CAO several weeks ago.

The error occurred after the list of this year's general nursing applicants was submitted to the CAO for "round zero" offers, which covers mature students.

The CAO made the bottom 200 general nursing candidates an offer instead of the top 200.

On legal advice, it decided it could not rescind the offer to the bottom 200. It also had to offer the top 200 their rightful place. So 400 candidates are expected to get an offer because of the error.

However, there is a middle group of between 100 and 200 applicants, who are angry they did not get a place.

The colleges, hospitals, An Bord Altranais and the CAO were yesterday trying to deal with this group.

According to sources, most of this group are likely to get an offer too, but nothing has yet been officially agreed.

Limerick Institute of Technology

The college's registrar, Mr Vincent McCarthy, points out that some of its courses were described incorrectly in the CAO cut-off points list released earlier this week.

The correct names for the courses are:

LC 331 - Sofware Development

LC471 - Quantity Surveying

LC481 - Valuation Surveying

LC 491 - Building Management

Random selection

The issue of random selection continues to occupy readers.

The following question is typical: "Will a course which had random selection in the first round fall in points in the second round?"

Over 50 degree courses operated on the basis of random selection in the first round.

The bad news is these courses are least likely to drop in the second round. Most colleges, if they have unfilled places after the first round, will use the second round to give them to those who lost out because of random selection.

In other words, they will do their best to satisfy everyone who missed a place because of random selection.

Most colleges will not be able to do much for those who were five or 10 points off. But this is not certain and there is always a glimmer of hope in the CAO process.

Many of you are also wondering what happens if a student is upgraded in October and has the points for a certain course, but the course is subject to random selection.

In that case, the CAO looks at the candidate's random number (generated when the candidate originally applied) and if it is higher than the last candidate who was accepted the student gets a place. If their number is lower they do not get a place.

Offers

Some confusion was caused in the Options 2001 supplement this week.

It stated: "If you don't accept an offer from your first round at all, you're automatically out of the loop."

This is not correct. If you do not accept any offer in the first round you can still be offered one subsequently if the points go down. You stay in the system until all the places have been allocated.

Vacant places:

More vacant places are advertised by the colleges. On the degree list these include:

Dundalk Institute of Technology

Business Studies - French (DK206)

Business Studies - German (DK306)

On the certificate/diploma list these include:

Athlone Institute of Technology

Construction Studies (AL015)

Applied Biology (AL016)

Cell and Molecular Biology (AL021)

Humanities (AL026)

Institute of Technology Tallaght

Science (applied biology or applied chemistry or instrumentation and applied physics) (TA003)

Applied Languages (TA 105)

Languages with Heritage Studies (TA107)

Engineering - Microelectronics and semi-conductor manufacturing (TA404)

Engineering - electro-mechanical systems (TA 504)

Letterkenny Institute of Technology

Aquatic Science (LY001) Accounting Technician (LY002) Crais Eolais Oifige (LY005) Business Studies/Languages and European Studies (LY007) Mechanical Engineering (LY011) Science - Applied Biology (LY013) Design, Industrial Design (LY016)

Electronics and Computer Engineering (LY039)

Environmental Engineering (LY046)

Because of space limitations we cannot bring you all the vacant places today, but we will publish the others in Monday's column.