#leaving-cert

#leaving-cert

Around 73pc of all Leaving Cert students went to college last year, as financial pressures increase

Matriarch Martina is often seen as the driving force behind her 10 children

Round two of CAO offers are out today and I suspect it'll be busy due to, what's this we're calling it, volatility in points for courses. Volatility, also known as a huge hike in points for the majority of degree courses in our top universities. Yes, the attempt at grade deflation didn't work to bring down course requirements, so we still saw kids with 625 points missing out on their first preferences while places were awarded by the random selection lottery.

More than 65,000 candidates sat exams this year

Almost 20,000 CAO applicants this year sat the Leaving Cert in previous years and benefitted from the pandemic-era measures

On Monday evening, Shortt attended a homecoming at Galway Corinthians rugby club, where he'd spent much of his sporting youth before deciding, as an U-16, that the time was right to focus on swimming. "I didn't expect so many people to show up," he says of the welcome back. "I think half the town was there. It was great seeing everybody and I was just very proud."

Sarah Majchrzak (18) from Tallaght has been studying hard since summer last year and is now hoping for the best

Now that the Leaving Cert results are out, attention turns to college and career, but what road should you take when the map is being redrawn by AI? The Leaving Cert results are out and college offers are around the corner. Yet for Ireland's class of 2025, a larger question overshadows the scramble for places: will three or four years of lectures and tens of thousands of euro really equip students for a labour market in which artificial intelligence is advancing at breakneck speed?

In fact, for many this stress fest will be over in a few days.

"I was a musician and I suppose, really, I always wanted to get into performance. But I didn't realise it - and that's a big problem too..."