When you log on to the State Exams Commissions (SEC) portal this morning to discover what grades you have been awarded, you will not know from what process this result emanated.
It may derive from the final outcome of the standardised assessed grade process overseen by the SEC based on the mark originally awarded by your subject teachers.
Alternatively, it may derive from a higher grade you achieved if your efforts in the written papers, which you sat in June, secured you a higher grade than the standardised grade determined by the assessed grades system.
For the approximately 80 per cent of this year's Leaving Cert class who are seeking a college place through the CAO application process, the first task will be to turn the grades you have been awarded into CAO points.
You are only likely to do this exercise once in a lifetime and it is easy to get it wrong and cause yourself and your parents’ unnecessary anxiety. So, take a few minutes and carefully determine your CAO points score.
You should have a points chart to hand and sites such as careersportal.ie have features to enable you to enter your assessed grades and receive a CAO points calculation. No matter what the outcome, it is worth remembering that success comes in many forms.
For one student, a score of 560 points may be devastating in terms of studying veterinary medicine at UCD; for another, 250 points may represent a huge achievement.
Remember, you count the best six scores you’ve achieved across all subjects.
If you did the Leaving Certificate Vocational Programme (LCVP) and your score for the module is better than your lowest of the six scores, you can include the LCVP instead. If you got at least a H6 in higher-level maths, you add 25 to the normal points score attached to the grade you achieved.
There are some slight variations in how points are calculated by some third-level colleges, and all such variations are clearly outlined in the CAO handbook. If you cannot find your copy, it is available online at cao.ie.
Will my CAO points score secure me my desired courses?
There is a widespread misperception among the general public and many students that points are determined by the colleges and that you aim to reach that target over the two years of your Leaving Cert studies.
The UCAS system in the United Kingdom works on that basis. If you meet the target grades the college or course director in question set you, then you secure your place.
In a pre-2020 year, the CAO points required to secure the last place offered the previous year was usually a good indicator of whether your hopes would turn into a CAO offer.
In 2020, students taking higher-level papers, under the calculated grades system, secured approximately 10 per cent higher marks than the 2019 class. Less than 4 per cent of the 2020 class went on to take written papers in November/December 2020, which saw 600-700 of them secure higher grades sufficient to secure them a higher offer from their CAO course wish list, which they will take up this year. Those 600-700 places represent a slice of this year’s pie that is already allocated.
If one were to accept that the outcome of the assessed grades process may generally be in line with the 2020 outcome, the question that arises is: how high will grade inflation rise in 2021 when students who secure a better grade in their written paper than their standardised assessed one integrate that result into the Leaving Cert they secured today?
We will not know the answer to this question until next Tuesday when the CAO releases its offers, but it would be prudent to expect that the CAO points required for the most sought-after courses will rise considerably.
If, for example, a large proportion of students secure better grades in three of the subjects they sat the exam in than they were awarded by the assessed grades process, that would add 34 CAO points to their overall score, above that which was secured by an equivalent student at this stage of the process in 2020.
Given that the number of places are fixed, then the last person to secure a place in 2021 will be determined by the higher scores outlined above.
To counter this effect, Minister for Higher Education Simon Harris has sought to increase the number of places on offer across highly sought-after courses, to attempt to keep the rise in CAO points for such programmes to a minimum.
Is the process fair to all?
There may be a level of justice in what is going to occur next Tuesday as it relates to this year’s Leaving Cert class. The rising tide of grade inflation will raise all boats, but the highest-achieving students will still secure the coveted high-demand courses, leaving some who this year secured the points required in 2020 for the course they are hoping to secure an offer in next Tuesday bitterly disappointed.
Where this fairness breaks down is in relation to the 8,000-plus students from the class of 2020 who are applying for a place this year. Even more disadvantaged are a similar number of this year’s CAO applicants who sat the Leaving Cert in 2019, and in the years immediately preceding it, who have had no benefit from the generosity of their teacher’s optimism through assessed grades, or the easier papers set in 2021 which reflected lost tuition time for the class of 2021, and are stuck with the results they achieved when they sat the traditional Leaving Cert. Many of them were bitterly disappointed not to receive an offer in 2020 and have applied again this year.
They will look with growing trepidation at the celebration of their younger peers today and reflect on what these results will mean for their hopes of securing their longed-for course in the coming weeks. How will the Minister deal with this reality when it reveals itself after 2pm next Tuesday afternoon?
Other options
There are alternatives to the CAO that are worth considering as well. Ireland has a growing system of further education and training (FET), consisting of an extensive range of PLC courses along with an enhanced and expanding apprenticeship programmes where ongoing training and part-time study are built into the job.
These routes from school to further education provide many opportunities for the tens of thousands of young learners who wish to develop their abilities and skills in a way that is best suited to them.
Indeed, many courses ultimately lead to a third-level qualification.
For a significant cohort of those leaving secondary schools each year the option of studying for a QQI level-five or six award at the local FE college or starting an apprenticeship, which mixes working in employment alongside study, is by far the most appropriate choice, even if a CAO place happens to be available to them.
Further education courses are provided in Education and Training Board colleges throughout the country. Courses are designed to consolidate the learning of those who excel in disciplines ranging from IT, science , business and art.
As much as 20 per cent of places in many of the courses with the highest CAO points are reserved for graduates of FE courses each year and see applicants securing places and thriving in those courses even though, 12 months previously, they may have been hundreds of CAO points short of the required entry score.
Other FE courses are designed to prepare students to enter directly into high-quality employment, in vocational/employment-focused courses such as pre-Garda/pre-paramedic, childcare, hairdressing, animal health care, etc immediately on completion of their one- or two-year programmes.
More information on CAO-linked PLC/FE courses is available from careersportal.ie while details of every PLC/FE course in the country are available through the qualifax.ie website.
The Irish Times will publish a special guide to these QQI-validated courses in a special Smart Choices supplement on Tuesday, September 7th.
