Your B at AS is worth 60. Check this page:
http://www.tcd.ie/Admissions/undergraduate/newsite/requirements/matriculation/gcse/ You should be fine points-wise.
You do know it's not straight Economics right? BESS means you're studying common modules in 1st year, and then specialising. In 4th year you can graduate in just straight Economics if you want, or keep it broader.
Do you have a language other than English to at least GCSE level? You cannot get in without a pass in one. (Irish students study Irish, English and a third language as compulsory subjects for the whole 5/6 years so this is the reason).
TCD has the highest number of international students, 1 in 8, a fact which jumps it up the rankings. Places are reserved in every single course for internationals, but you are still being pitted against Irish students as there will be more people applying both international and Irish than the course allows.
You will have to pay full international fees unfortunately, unless you have been resident in an EU country for 3 of the last 5 years...no? If so the fees will be €2000. If not, full fees- which are definitely at least €10,000. You need to supply some sort of cert stating your profiency at English, though I'm a bit hazy on that. You don't get lower offers, they might technically be slightly lower (the system does favour those with A-Levels because Irish students do far more subjects) but they are formulated to be as equal as possible.
Download the prospectus here
http://www.tcd.ie/Admissions/undergraduate/prospectus/ It will answer some questions in detail.
It is NOTHING like UCAS. You apply online
www.cao.ie Applications open in November for the following academic year on entry. They close Feb 1st but don't apply in the last week as their servers die under the pressure.
http://www.cao.ie/index.php?page=downloads The first one in the table there is the CAO handbook- ESSENTIAL READING!
No personal statement, no predicted grades. No names even, you're just given an anononymous number. You write down 10 (or just 1, or any number up to 10) of any course in any university. They can all be from one, they can all be different universities. None of the unis will know your other choices. They must be IN GENUINE ORDER OF PREFERENCE. So many people put second the thing they want most but don't think they can get and then if it turns out they have enough points for it, too bad, you never get offered anything below number 1 if you have the points for number 1, even if you reject that offer. You can change the order of your choices and add on/take away some at later stages.
Our exams finish at the end of June. Results come out mid-August. 5 days later, CAO offers come out- using only your actual grades. They come out online at 6AM. Max points possible is 600, about 16 students out of 60,000 get that- that's how hard it is, way harder than getting A*A*A*A*. Any course over 500 is extremely competitive, luckily you're below that threshold. The first person to get the place in a course has the highest points. They work down the list and if a course has 30 places, the 30th and last person, their points become the 'points' of the cours,e ie. the minimum. It's also referred to as the cut-off point. Courses in Trinity tend to go up as demand increases for it, other unis tend to stay static or drop slightly. If you're wondering why English and History is far more points than Midwifery, Engineering and Comp Science, demand is the reason.
What you're looking at there is matriculation requirements. These are extremely low. For example, for Irish students they require a pass in English, Maths, Irish, French and 2 other subjects. Yet this would give you a total points score of as low as 200 or so. Yet this is for courses that you haven't a hope of getting unless you have a load of A's and 570 points. So they are only a guide, they don't paint any picture of the university or its courses. Nobody but nobody gets in with grades like a load of passes.
There is an entrance exam for Medicine, and also for Mature-entry courses and practical courses require portfolios. But nothing for BESS except you need English-proficiency certs.
Yes, almost everything is a BA, even Science. This is an old-fashioned thing, but means nothing different than a B.Sci in practice. Not something to focus on. I think it's pretty cool!
Extremely well, far and away the best in Ireland, 13th in Europe. It is ranked above St. Andrews and Warwick. This is extremely impressive because Trinity's funding and research funding isd much lower than the top universities, in some cases only a fraction. It was in debt and is now breaking even. It has a copyright library like Oxford and Cambridge- that is, the rights to every book printed in the UK and Ireland since 1801. So the libraries are massive, but most books are stored off-capus, which you can order. It beats the libraries of other unis here by a mile, but its opening hours are less than some.
What you make it. Extremely active sports and societies. Two of the societies are hundreds of years old, have their own gothic buildings, and host debates with celebrity speakers. Very much old-world Trinity. Sports facilities are very good, but don't know much about them. The gym is new and top-class really. There's loads of choirs and orchestras too. The Student's Union is very active too. The Arts bulding where you'll be based is a bit Communist looking but it's fine.
As I said, 1 in 8. There are 17,000 or so students, and it's a very compact campus. You could not have a better location. The majority of non-Irish students in the Arts block are British and American. In the Science/Medicine end, are Asians, Arabs etc. Now obviously there are a few but fairly sparse in arts-based subjects. There is an International Office that runs information evenings and events and stuff, and everybody is very welcoming. There is an Islam prayer room on campus..there's a church also, originally Protestant and now Catholic. No Mosque but not really the demand or room for one. The nightlife might seem a bit overwhelming, as most societies do base themselves around nights out etc. but rest assured, there's a lot to do without drinking. Even things like quizzes are very popular in societies. Your course would be more social than most as it's huge, but nobody is going to sneer at you or exclude you because you don't drink. You can still be involved in a lot.
The city is very small, and very historic. It is about 1200 years old or so. It can look a bit grim as the weather is generally rainy or overcast- though as for coldness, not so much, it's quite mild. Now it CAN look dangerous because as it's small, it's easier to see homeless people and addicts than it is in places like London. Also, methadone clinics are all in the city centre- wonderful idea. Parts of the city aren't great- the sidestreets off O'Conell Street and Eden Quay, which is all the one area. The Southside where Trinity is is better. I've always felt safe there, coming homr from college, coming home from work, coming home from mights out- years and years of not feeling intimidated, threatened or being mugged.
The country is beautiful. Dublin is on the coast, and has beautiful seaside villages, beaches and hills only a short distance away on a DART (electric train). The most beautiful rural parts of the country are Donegal, West Cork, West Kerry and Connemara (Galway). Connemara is Irish-speaking but soooo worth a visit. Have a nice google image search and see for yourself! Donegal is the furthest away, it's a 5 hour bus journey, but the rest are a good but closer, 3 hours on a train max. Train fares are good for students- about €30-40 depending on destination.
Sure, you can take a trip up (or down) to coastal Dublin for the day, or down the country. Dublin itself is filled with galleries, musuems, lovely city parks and interesting tours and walking tours.