The deadline for applying to sit written Leaving Cert exams will be moved after errors were discovered with the calculated grades system.
Education Minister Norma Foley told Newstalk Breakfast that the deadline - originally set for tomorrow - will be moved, with the 'exact timeframe' to be announced after the new results are available to students.
The written exams will take place in November.
It was confirmed yesterday that around 6,500 students will receive at least one upgraded result after coding errors were discovered in the predictive grading process.
Minister Foley has today again apologised to all Leaving Cert students for the situation.
She said it will be a 'matter of days' before her department is in a position to confirm any new grades, with international oversight of the process currently ongoing.
The upgrades mean hundreds of students could potentially be entitled to a higher CAO offer than they originally received.
The minister said: “Last year there were 17,000 appeals… of those appeals, there were 3,000 upgrades, and of those upgrades just 600 were entitled to a higher preference offer. All of those higher preference offers were in the existing academic year, bar three.
“[This year] all that can possibly be done will be done to ensure the maximum number of students will receive an offer they should receive.
"We are hopeful they will be in a position to take that up in this academic year."
It comes after universities warned that they don’t have capacity to offer places to everyone affected by errors in the Leaving Cert calculated grades process.
Error
Minister Foley said she was informed last Wednesday that Canadian company Polymetrika had identified an error in the software used to analyse student data, but that was all officials here knew at that stage.
The error was related to the junior cycle element of the calculated grading process - although the minister insisted that aspect was not school profiling.
She said: "The element that was referred to as school profiling was removed.
"This was an acknowledgement that Junior Certificate is not always the best judgement of how a student will perform in Leaving Cert.
“There were a number of elements to it. The strongest weight in terms of standardisation was the percentage mark given by the teacher."
She said the contract with Polymetrika does include causes related to penalties, and that "everything that needs to be done in that regard will absolutely will be done".
She said: “I want to acknowledge that the original error was identified by Polymetrika - the focus now is doing the work that needs to be done."
