In September Dunboyne College of Further Education will commence its 16th year of offering a quality education product to Meath, west Dublin, north Kildare and surrounding areas. We have grown to over 670 students doing QQI level 5 and 6 courses at our campus in Dunboyne Business Park.
As well as being the only dedicated PLC further education college in County Meath, west Dublin, Kildare and the surrounding areas, over 90% of the students who have achieved a full QQI level 5 award with Dunboyne College in recent years have received third level offers and countless others have proceeded directly to employment.
The feedback on the courses from students has been excellent in terms of the new skills and confidence; students felt they received the confidence to go on to future learning, to build up their skills, and to access job opportunities. Courses are increasing in popularity with this year over 1960 students applying for 600 places.
An ideal route
One year QQI level 5 Programmes like the majority run in Dunboyne are an ideal way to pursue a course in an area of interest and to access a third level course. By having a day a week in work experience students can also put into practice their skills and assess their competency.
The flexible options in Dunboyne allow students to sample various modules in September to make sure they are pursuing the correct course choice. Students often do far better at further education level as they are now studying in an area of their passion and aptitude like nursing, sports or cookery rather than in the Leaving Cert where Irish English Math’s etc were compulsory.
As students also learn referencing, research and self-directed learning they tend to stay the full third level course afterwards unlike many who go straight from leaving cert not very sure of their options.
Dropout rates of less than 5% at higher education for those who do a further education course like those in Dunboyne College first, can be compared to an average of 8 to 10% drop out rate in the universities and 20% in the IT colleges.
Range of places
There are now a whole range of places available to Dunboyne College graduates in certificate and degree courses in Maynooth University, DCU, DIT, UCD, IT Blanchardstown, TCD; and with many other institutions around the country through the QQI Links Scheme.
This year over 270 of students received offers including 80 to Maynooth University, 126 to IT Blanchardstown and 70 to DIT and 19 to DCU among others.
Also this year the college introduces Psychology, Sports Injury Prevention, Liberal Arts and Human Resource Management to add to the courses in Equine Business, Airline Studies, Hairdressing, Pharmacy Assistant, Beauty Therapy, Office Administration, Retail Studies, Employability Skills, Computer Systems and Networks, and Creative Media which were introduced over the last two years.
Dunboyne College continues to run its very successful original courses in Nursing, Social Studies, Art, Pre University Business and Pre University Arts programmes which have been added to over the years by students studying Childcare/Special Needs Assistant, Health Service Skills, Pre University Science, Food Science, Animal Care, Multimedia, Sound Engineering, Sports Science and Sports Management. The college continues to run its professional Cookery Course in conjunction with DIT and a whole range of level 6 second year programmes are also available.
Expansion
Dunboyne College of Further Education will be expanding into many new areas of educational opportunity in the coming years and anyone wishing to obtain further information on these opportunities should find out about us online at
http://www.dunboynecollege.ie or on Facebook or Twitter.
There is an On Line Enrolment on-going with interviews on the 6th March, 2nd May and late June. Late applications will be taken until late September depending on availability on the courses.
School leavers, mature students, lifelong learners and those who want further opportunities to progress in their jobs will all benefit from these QQI programmes in Dunboyne. It should never be thought about as an extra year, but rather as a year to explore what you really want to do, and a passport to make that it is possible.
