CAO day: Points race slowed as colleges look to broaden course entries

The opening of broader entry routes to third-level courses instead of expecting Leaving Certificate students to decide on specialisations appears to be having some moderate effects on the points race.

Since a 2011 drive to ease the points race that helps define how students prepare for exams and learn at second-level, one long-standing recommendation has been to eliminate the high numbers of specialised CAO courses.

In some colleges, most notably University College Dublin (UCD) and now also at Maynooth University, several courses in some disciplines have been merged for first-year entrants.