College received go-ahead despite financial losses

Hibernia College, the private Dublin institute which gives an online teacher-training course, had question marks over its continued existence at the time it got authorisation for its courses from the Minister of Education.

The auditors to Hibernia College Ltd noted concerns about the college's continued ability to trade in its most recent financial accounts, which were for the 17-month period to the end of July 2003.

At the time the college had accumulated losses of €1.7 million.

"The financial statements have been prepared on the going-concern basis, the validity of which is dependent on sufficient future funding being made available," the auditors noted.

However, the directors of the company stated that after July 2003 the college received accreditation from the Higher Education Training & Awards Council (HETAC) for "a suite of degree and diploma courses".

"Based on curent enrolments income in excess of €2.3 million will accrue in 2003-2004 . . . The directors are confident that the future profitability of the company, based on the courses developed to date and those yet to be finalised, will be sufficient to enable the future profitable trading of the company."

Hibernia was incorporated in May 2000. Yesterday Mr Sean Rowland, executive chairman and a major shareholder in Hibernia, said the company had planned that it would invest money in building up its services for 2½ years, before it would be able to begin offering courses.

"It was planned. At no stage had we envisaged not spending money before taking in students," he said.

The college was now profitable. It had more than 500 students, with 300 doing the teacher-training course and other courses that included hospitality management, criminal justice and public administration.

New courses were planned, including some that would be offered to students abroad.

The Minister for Education, Mr Dempsey, approved a number of courses in the college, including the teacher-training course, in early August 2003. It was the State's first online graduate diploma course in primary education.

Two teacher-training colleges, St Patrick's College, Dublin, and Mary Immaculate in Limerick, expressed concern about the decision, saying there had been no consultation with them before the announcement.

The Irish National Teachers' Organisation (INTO) has also expressed concern.

Yesterday Mr Austin Corcoran, its president, said it would expect that HETAC and the Minister would take full account of Hibernia's financial standing before giving recognition to its courses.

However, a spokeswoman for the Minister said he would not examine a private company's finances. The courses were approved by HETAC, and there was a scheme in place to protect students in the case of the collapse of a for-profit educational institution.

Mr Séamus Puirséil, chief executive of HETAC, said it was its function to assess educational programmes, staff and facilities before approving a particular course.

It approved courses rather than colleges, and the finances of a particular college were not its concern. He said a new academic institution would have "a fairly long lead-in time".