Nine degree options behind one code and one points cut off. Which means you are not competing on nine different cut offs, and a bad year for one option cannot lock you out of it.
One cut off for all nine is the real benefit here. At a college that priced Law with Politics and Law with History separately, a strong candidate could miss one by five points. Under DN600 they cannot.
This is not deferred choice. Years one and two combine the core law modules with modules specific to your named option, so you are studying it from the start. A student who assumes they can sample all nine and choose in May is mistaken.
UCD does not publish how or when the option is actually registered, whether on the CAO form, on a post-offer form, or at online registration. We looked and could not find it stated anywhere. It is a fair question for the Sutherland School of Law and worth asking before the CAO deadline rather than after.
DN600 can only be entered once on a CAO form. UCD offers three separate law codes: DN600 for the BCL and its options, DN610 for Business and Law, and DN620 for Criminology with Psychology. Those last two are not DN600 options, they are different degrees with their own points. Putting DN600 down because you want Business and Law gets you a Law degree.
First year focuses on the core Irish law modules. UCD names three consistently: Constitutional Law, Contract Law and Tort Law, alongside a general introduction to the Irish legal system and legal and professional skills.
Alongside those you take the modules for your option. For Law with Politics,
which is the only option with a published Stage 1 breakdown, that is two core modules:
POL10160 Foundations of Contemporary Politics in the autumn and
POL10180 Foundations of Political Theory in the spring. So roughly two
modules of your year are the option and the rest is law.
UCD publishes very little detail here compared to its science and arts programmes. The Stage 1 credit total, the full named core module list, and the option-specific module counts for History, Philosophy, Economics, Irish and Social Justice are all not found on any page that returns content. Most UCD law course pages are built so that only a browser can read them. Everything above comes from the UCD Law Undergraduate Prospectus 2026 and the SPIRe politics pages, which do publish theirs.
UCD names three core law subjects and a legal system module. Only one of them has a published descriptor we could read, so what follows is the descriptor where it exists and a plain description of the subject where it does not, marked as such.
LAW10360A critical introduction rather than a tour. Where law comes from and how the sources rank against each other in a common law system, held inside a rule of law framework. Courts, legislation and how judges interpret it, precedent, the judiciary, the place of EU and international law in Ireland, gender and feminism in the legal system, and access to justice. It is the module that tells you whether you find law interesting as a system, rather than as a career.
Descriptor not published. The subject is Bunreacht na hEireann: how the State is structured, the separation of powers, and the fundamental rights the Constitution protects and how the courts have interpreted them. In Ireland this is the spine of public law and it turns up in every year afterwards.
Descriptor not published. When a promise becomes legally binding: offer and acceptance, consideration, terms, when a contract can be undone, and what happens when somebody breaks one. The foundation of nearly all commercial practice.
Descriptor not published. Civil wrongs outside contract: negligence, duty of care, nuisance, defamation, and who pays when somebody is injured or their reputation damaged. This is the law behind most personal injury and professional negligence work.
Descriptor not published. Legal research, reading cases and statutes, writing and citation, and arguing a position. Unglamorous and the thing that most separates students who cope in second year from those who do not.
Law with Politics is the only option publishing its Stage 1 modules. Two of them, one each trimester, which gives a fair sense of the scale of the option across all nine.
POL10160How political power works and how groups make decisions together, and how that is shaped by ideas, interests and institutions. Power, the state and the nation, ideologies from liberalism and conservatism through nationalism, feminism and environmentalism, types of regime, electoral systems and the institutions of government.
POL10180Political theory taught through changing ideas of democracy, largely via Aristotle, Wollstonecraft, Mill and Marx. Liberty, equality and community, how much participation a democracy should have, and how a view of human nature decides which democracy is even possible. Closer to philosophy than to current affairs, and students expecting the latter should know that.
Where a descriptor could not be read, this page says so. The four core law entries above describe the subject as it is taught on any Irish law degree rather than quoting UCD, because UCD does not publish a version we could reach. Treat them as orientation, not as the syllabus. The Sutherland School of Law will give you the real module list if you ask.
Eight of the nine are yours. The BCL and Maitrise dual degree is not.
First year is spent on that option. Nobody starts on the dual degree.
UCD wording: subject to achieving sufficiently high grades in first year, you may then apply for interview to enter the BCL and Maitrise from second year onwards. So it is grades first, then an interview.
Which is a good degree in its own right. Nobody is left without a programme, and that matters: this is a much softer landing than the competitive majors in DN200, where a student can spend two years working towards something they do not get.
It requires H3 Leaving Certificate French, which is the real filter and applies from the CAO form onwards. The number of places is not published. Worth asking, because it is the difference between a realistic ambition and a lottery.
All nine are qualifying law degrees, so all nine lead to the professional route: the King's Inns for the bar, or Blackhall Place for the solicitors' route. The option shapes what you are good at afterwards rather than whether you can practise.
The straight degree. Practice, in-house legal roles, the civil service, regulation and compliance. The safest choice if you are not drawn to one of the pairings.
Competition law, regulation, financial services, and the economic side of policy. H6 Maths is strongly recommended. The best fit for anybody eyeing the Central Bank, the CCPC or a commercial firm.
Public law, policy, the Oireachtas, EU institutions and political advisory work. The one option with a published first year structure, which tells you something about how well organised the pairing is.
Constitutional and legal history, research, archives and the civil service, and a strong grounding for advocacy where the skill is building an argument from documents.
Jurisprudence, human rights, ethics and regulation of new technology. The most academic of the nine, and the best preparation for the reasoning that appears in appellate work.
Irish-medium legal practice, drafting and translation for the State, and the courts service. A small field with persistent demand and very few qualified people in it.
Human rights, NGOs, immigration and asylum, housing and social policy, and legal aid. Aims at public interest work and is honest about it.
Comparative and EU law, international firms, and the route into the dual degree. Needs H3 French.
Qualifications in two jurisdictions, and the strongest position of the nine for EU institutions and international practice. Entered from second year, on first year grades plus interview.
Ask at the open day: when exactly do I register my option and can I change it, how many modules of first year are the option rather than core law, and how many places are there on the dual degree.
Checked against UCD on 24 August 2026. Points are 2025 entry. Sources: the UCD Law Undergraduate Prospectus 2026, the UCD Sutherland School of Law undergraduate programmes page, myUCD, and the UCD SPIRe page for BCL Law with Politics, which is the only option publishing a Stage 1 module breakdown.
This page is thinner than the others in the series, and that is UCD's doing rather than ours. The law course pages, the hub course records and the Qualifax entry all return no content to anything except a browser. Three things a student would reasonably want to know are marked as not found above: the Stage 1 credit total, the full named core module list, and how the option is registered. If you get firm answers from the School, send them on and we will add them.