@Clavinova, your vague reply on the Irish Leaving Cert and university application/admission process is what I expected.
The Irish Leaving Cert is a nationwide exam offered in several iterations, including the Applied Leaving Cert, a less academic track.
Universities do not make offers directly to students. The process is almost completely automated, anonymous, and impersonal, handled centrally in the vast majority of courses and cases by the Central Applications Office.
Students list up to ten courses on their application, grades are sorted according to an order of merit, applicants are slotted into their first choice based on grades, then second, and on down the line until you get an offer, for students applying on the basis of LC results for the year of application. Each student is also assigned a random number and sometimes an offer is made based on random selection of this number if there are several students with equal grades applying for the same course and a limited number of places available on that course. 'Available Places' course applications can be made after offer rounds have closed if a student hasn't received an offer or an offer they like or if they find to their joy that they underestimated the results and applied for courses below the level they could have applied for.This process is more often used by underperforming students.
In a great many cases, students have a variety of courses/degrees that are similar in scope and value in their list. Nobody is assigned to a degree course for which they have not applied, and it is assumed students have researched all of their listed choices.
For instance, available courses in the area of Law -
www.qualifax.ie/index.php?option=com_wrapper&view=wrapper&Itemid=16
The mistakes have denied an unknown number - but estimated at up to 1,000 or more - of CAO applicants a preferred college offer, and higher education chiefs are meeting today to see how that can be put right.
It could cost about €10m to fund the extra places and it also leaves the Government dealing with the political fall-out from another debacle.
Higher Education Authority chief executive Alan Wall is meeting registrars of the universities and institutes of technology today to work through the possibilities of more offers, and he said the feedback was "positive".
Meanwhile, Mr Harris said "any resources required to provide additional college places will be forthcoming".
Trinity College Dublin provost Dr Patrick Prendergast said: "We are prepared to do anything in our power to find places for them if those places are fully funded by Government." Overall, there are about 7,200 subject upgrades involved but it does not mean every student will have enough extra points for a higher offer - up to 1,000 or more are anticipated.
www.independent.ie/irish-news/education/scramble-to-find-1000-extra-college-places-after-leaving-cert-grades-fiasco-39578028.html
There is certainly political hay to be made here, and it is certain that many a haystack will be formed. The American standardised testing behemoth ETS has been commissioned to examine what happened, and is yet to make a report on this year's unusual process.
However, confidence in the LC and CAO process remains strong, and will perhaps grow even stronger after this. It tends to be an equitable system, in contrast to that in the UK, especially with the DARE and HEAR pathways to higher education opportunity.