UK college places on the line for Leaving Cert students

There’s concern 4 thousand Irish students might lose their place in UK college courses if Leaving Cert results aren’t back by the end of August.
A stakeholder meeting is taking place today to discuss ongoing issues with the state exams.
Wednesday July 29th – that’s now the date the Education Minister hopes to start the Leaving Cert on.
But there’s still a number of issues yet to be resolved ahead of then.
4 thousand students with offers from UK universities have been told they need to have their Leaving Cert results by the end of August to guarantee their place.
The Department of Education says there’s ongoing engagement with the British Education Secretary to try and find a solution.
It’ll be one of the issues on the agenda at the third meeting of a stakeholder group today.
The uncertainty over the exams happening at all hasn’t gone away.
Colm Cregan, a former inspector of the Department of Education, thinks a form of predicted grades should be used.
That would then be applied to students’ average results since the start of 5th year.
The Education Minister told the Dail last night that predicted grades are among a range of contingencies being looked at.