Congratulations to all the students who have just received their CAO results and have chosen Architecture as their career.

The RIAI has a neat summary of the points required this year (and those for last year) for the Architecture courses in Ireland – HERE Below is a summary table from their website:

It feels sometimes as if I’ve been chasing recessions; so what can we learn from the CAO points for Architecture?:

The colleges are split; half have gone up and half down; generally when the demand is high (i.e. when the points go up) there is optimism in the market. If you take an average recession cycle at 9-10 years with the last in 2008 (I didn’t know it was officially the ‘Great’ recession) – the current intake of students may be lucky enough to get through the course and then have a few years in work before the recession kicks in again. Who knows, especially when the points requirement are split and we still don’t know what’s going to happen as regards Brexit.

Interestingly if you factor in IT Sligo (see the RIAI note printed again below); their Architecture course has gone up a whopping 45 points (from 300 to 345)

The Institute of Technology Sligo has applied to the RIAI for the accreditation and subsequent prescription of their 5-year Bachelors of Architecture (Hons) degree – CAO Code SG347. In February 2019 this degree was awarded Provisional Approval by the RIAI in line with the RIAI Qualifications in Architecture: Procedures for Prescription under the Building Control Act 2007. The earliest that this qualification may achieve full accreditation by the RIAI and prescription under the Building Control Act 2007 is when the first cohort of students graduate from the programme in 2023. Therefore, the Bachelors of Architecture degree (BArch) at Institute of Technology Sligo has begun the prescription process but is not currently prescribed for the purposes of registration as an architect in Ireland under the Building Control Act 2007.