Both agriculture and veterinary saw decreases in CAO applications in 2022 versus 2021, according to data published by the Central Applications Office (CAO).

There were almost 20% less CAO applications for Level 8 agriculture courses in 2022, the data found.

Some 17% less first preference CAO applications were received also.

Just 2,343 students put a Level 8 agriculture course down on their CAO, in any order, in 2022 while 2,907 did so the year previous.

Some 504 students wanted it as their first choice in 2021 while just 419 did in 2022.

Level 6/7

Some 6% less first preference applications were received by the CAO for Level 6/7 agriculture courses in 2022.

In 2021 just 860 students put a Level 6/7 agriculture course down as first preference on their CAO, while this number was just 808 in 2022.

Veterinary

Meanwhile, there were 4% less first preference CAO applications for veterinary in 2022.

Overall, veterinary was down 2% across total CAO mentions.

There was 7% less first preference CAO applications for agriculture in

In the Level 6/7 veterinary course classification, there was a total of 3,793 applications for related courses in 2022 and 3,764 in 2021, representing a slight increase of 29 or 1%.

  • Largest decline

    • More than 13,000 less students put health-related courses down on their CAO in 2022. This was the largest decrease across all courses.

    Of this, 13,000, nursing and midwifery accounted for 87% of the decrease.

    Almost 88,000 wanted to pursue a health-related career in 2021. This figure dropped to 75,000 in 2022.

    Nursing and midwifery on its own saw a 27% decrease in 2022 of students who had it down as their first preference.

    Across the board in 2022, 8,600 more females applied to the CAO in comparison to male applications.