WIT offers ‘second chance' to course applicants

Wednesday, 17th August 2011

Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT) has announced a pilot ‘second chance scheme' for students who have not achieved the required maths grade in their Leaving Certificate for their chosen course in WIT.

Students will be given another opportunity to matriculate to the Institute by sitting a Leaving Certificate equivalent paper at the end of August. The exam will be available to candidates who have already applied for a course in WIT. The exam does not provide additional points so intending applicants must have already achieved the cut-off points for their programme of choice.

Launching the initiative, Dr. Derek O'Byrne, Registrar at Waterford Institute of Technology said: "The Institute's Academic Council wanted to offer Leaving Certificate students every opportunity possible to access our programmes and recognise the importance of maths as a key skill underpinning performance at third level. We believe that this second chance route will encourage students to engage with maths and will provide them with an opportunity to demonstrate their competence in the subject. Too much rests on their performance on one day of the year."

"While we cannot anticipate how many students will take up this pilot matriculation scheme, we are pleased to confirm that students who achieve the required maths grade under this initiative will be offered a place in the third round of CAO offers," he said.

Gerard Morgan, CEO of City of Waterford VEC welcomed the initiative saying: "We are delighted that City of Waterford VEC and WIT are partnering to develop this initiative. It is important that students get every opportunity to demonstrate their ability and this scheme does that. We will support the pilot by providing a short revision course for any candidates who wish to take the WIT matriculation examination." Depending on interest, the City of Waterford VEC revision course/s will take place from Tuesday 23rd August and will run until Friday 26th August. Students will undertake revision of the ordinary level papers for €150.

The standard of the paper will be equivalent to the Leaving Certificate Ordinary Level paper one and paper two. Costing €35, the exam will take place on 31 August in the Main Campus at WIT. The exam is not applicable to students seeking places on WIT's nursing programmes due to restricted availability of places or for the B. Eng in Electronic Engineering because of minimum professional qualifications. 

An application form and full details of the scheme will be available on http://www.wit.ie