Trinity has seen a downward trend in first preference applications this year, with 7,675 students placing Trinity at the top of their Central Applications Office (CAO) choice form. A total of 17,733 students applied to Trinity, which account for 23% of all CAO applicants. 3,336 places were offered to students to study at the university.
Trinity’s new science programmes were popular with incoming students, with Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Chemical Sciences, Geography and Geoscience, and Physical Sciences scoring 509, 507, 413, and 509 points respectively. These courses replaced the Science, Human Genetics, Chemistry with Molecular Modelling, Medicinal Chemistry, Nanoscience, Physics and Chemistry of Advanced Materials, and Earth Sciences courses.
Human sciences have seen levels similar to 2017. Human Health and Disease has seen an increase from 532 to 542, with Dental Science also rising from 589 to 590. Medicine has decreased from 732 to 731, while Physiotherapy has decrease from 543 to 542. Radiation therapy has also seen a one point decrease to 509.
Nursing programmes such as General Nursing have decreased from 410 to 408. Points for mental health nursing have increased from 373 to 389.
Trinity has also seen increases in its two undergraduate engineering programmes this year. Engineering has risen by 18 points to 488, while Engineering with Management has risen from 499 to 510.
Among arts subjects, economics and psychology have seen an increase, rising to 509 and 565 respectively. European Studies has seen a rise to 541 from 520, while Philosophy, Political Science, Economics and Sociology (PPES) has also risen from 555 to 563. Global business has seen a rise of 11 points to 555, while business studies and german has risen from 489 to 506.
Law has decreased from 542 to 533, with psychology dropping by one point to 543, while Law and French has remained the same at 567. Law and German has seen a fall of 32 points, to 509. Law and business and Law and Political Science have also seen small decreases.
Trinity also saw a fall of 13% in applications for TSM courses. Courses such as Ancient History and Archaeology, and Music have seen close to a 130 point drop, with Modern Irish seeing a 174 point drop.
Trinity’s Vice Provost and Chief Academic Officer, Professor Chris Morash, congratulated incoming students, saying: “It is an impressive achievement and a real testament to all of your hard work. For those coming to Trinity, you are about to begin an enriching personal and intellectual journey which can lead you to any number of destinations.”
He continued: “We are in the midst of a major revisioning of our undergraduate education, one that aims to make a Trinity education one that will enable our students to reach their full potential both inside and outside the classroom.”
Trinity saw 763 CAO applications from Northern Irish students this year. This was a decrease from last year’s 958. This 20% decrease is being attributed to Brexit complications. It was the first decrease in levels since 2014, when 601 students applied to study at Trinity.
Trinity has also seen a decrease in applications from the UK. The current number of 552 is an 11% decrease from 2017.
Trinity has also experienced a fall in the number of first preference CAO applications. College has seen an 8% drop in first preference applicants. This is greater than the national decrease, which stands at 4.5%, making Trinity the university with the largest decrease.
Trinity has seen decreases in subjects such as political science, mathematics, and history. College has raised concerns that this may lead to the decrease in first preference applications to below the level of available spaces within two years. First preference applications to two subject moderatorships (TSM) also fell by 18%.
Arts and science courses experienced a drop of over 7%. The largest increases were seen in law and education based courses.
Last year, Trinity saw 18,624 applicants, with 8,278 first choice applications. Of those applicants, 3,403 students were offered a place to study at the university.
