HEAR and DARE are two schemes that offer college places on a reduced points basis to school leavers who meet their criteria. They run through the CAO application, they have their own deadlines, and they are decided on evidence rather than on your grades.
HEAR is the Higher Education Access Route, for school leavers from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Eligibility is assessed against a set of financial, social and cultural indicators, with income as the first gate.
DARE is the Disability Access Route to Education, for school leavers with a disability or a significant ongoing illness that has had an educational impact. It is assessed on medical evidence and on a report from your school.
You can apply for both if both apply to you. Neither removes a course's entry requirements: they change the points at which you can be offered a place, within a quota, not what the course needs you to have studied.
The paperwork is the hard part
This is the honest summary of both schemes: the eligibility criteria are published and reasonably clear, and most unsuccessful applications fail on documentation rather than on merit.
There are two separate deadlines. The CAO application by 1 February at 5pm, where you tick the box to apply for HEAR, DARE or both and fill in the extra sections. Then a later deadline for supporting documents, which falls weeks afterwards. Missing the second one ends the application no matter how eligible you are.
The documents are specific. Income evidence for HEAR has to be the exact documents named for the exact tax year. Medical evidence for DARE has to be on the scheme's own form, completed by the right kind of professional, with a diagnosis and an account of educational impact. A letter in the wrong format from the right doctor is still the wrong format.
What to do about it
Start in November, not January. Getting a consultant to complete a form takes weeks. Getting a Revenue document takes days you may not have in February.
Read the current year's checklist on the official site rather than a summary. Both schemes publish exactly what they accept, and the detail changes. Start at accesscollege.ie, which runs both schemes, and check what your CAO application says you still owe them.
Talk to your guidance counsellor early. The school section of a DARE application has to come from the school, and schools are busy in the weeks before a deadline.
Keep copies of everything you send.
If you are over 23
Neither scheme is for you. You apply as a mature student instead, which is a different assessment with its own advantages.