Do you have a son or daughter sitting the Leaving Certificate this year?
If so, the CAO can be incredibly daunting. The number of courses on offer continues to grow (there's approximately 2000 to choose from this year) so selecting the right ones can be seriously challenging. For this reason, many young people make the wrong CAO choices. The result? A recent Higher Education Authority (
HEA) report outlined that 16 per cent of first year students dropped out of college in 2014.
With the CAO ‘Change of Mind’ facility opening on May 5, now is good time to start thinking about college courses, order of preference, and whether your teen is satisfied with what they have submitted.
We asked Patricia McGrath, principal of Cork's Hewitt College, for her advice on how to be a CAO asset for your teenager. Here's what you need to know:
1. If you don't like your course, changing to another could incur one full year of fees, which can cost up to a hefty €8,000. Add this to an extra year of accommodation and living expenses (estimated at €1,500 per month for UCD students), and it can be an unexpected and crippling expense.
2. Over 1,000 students who attain in excess of 500 points receive no CAO offer every year. If your teenager is thinking about only putting down courses that could possibly require points of over 500, get them to rethink their options. Also, make sure they double-check the entry requirements for every course they are interested in. Some will require specific grades in specified subjects. Check colleges’ course requirements on
qualifax.ie. Remember, always have a safety net!
3. If your teenager thinks he or she won’t get into the high point courses, such as Medicine, Occupational Therapy, Physiotherapy and Primary Teaching, then tell them about conversion courses. They can choose an undergraduate course in a similar field, and once graduated, they need only do an interview or entrance exam for their dream course, and, depending on the qualification, can be fully qualified within two years.
4. Has your teen considered the option of attending college in the UK or Holland? If the course of their dreams requires points that are out of reach, look past the CAO and consider the abroad option where they can study a wide range of courses from English to Psychology to Physiotherapy with attractive entry requirements.
5. The UK has a great system called Clearing, which is a way of matching universities without students to students without universities. It comes into operation the day of the Leaving Cert results and you can check what courses have spaces available. Often there are vacancies in courses such as Pharmacy, Radiography and Nursing. These places are allocated following an interview – by phone or in-person.
Patricia McGrath will speak at Choosing the Right CAO Course seminars in The Horse & Jockey Hotel, Tipperary on Monday, April 25; the Ormonde Hotel, Kilkenny on Tuesday, April 26 and The Gleneagle Hotel, Killarney on Wednesday, April 27. Tickets €25 on 021 4550430. 
