Why are we now going to spend our money on supporting the wealthy through third level while asset stripping our colleges?
LAST THURSDAY started very well. I had hardly finished my breakfast before I had two phonecalls telling me that DCU has gone up in the world rankings.
Last year, we were at number 302 in the Times Higher Education global league table, and this year we rose to 279. There are now five Irish universities in the top 300 globally, with the highest at 43.
All of us went up this year, so while we are not yet clustering right at the top, at least we are making a visible impression. Considering the income of the colleges here is a fraction of what British and, in particular, US universities get, that really isn’t a bad performance.
Still, the problem is that we may be looking at the peak of Irish university success, and that from here it’s all going to be downhill. Why do I say that? Because what we have seen in this year’s rankings is the result of Government investment in the sector and efforts by staff and students to make good use of our resources. But all of that is in decline.
Last year, the Government started a process of serious cuts in funding for third level, cuts we know will continue this year. Even before last year, during the good times, funding was not keeping pace with inflation and growth in numbers, but we managed to absorb that somehow, partly by not spending enough money on equipment and maintenance.
Mind you, I’m not going to whine about this. I know that national finances are in trouble and I accept that we are going to have to share some of the resulting pain. What concerns me right now isn’t that our finances are under pressure, but rather that we don’t have the means to develop a strategy to secure our future success. Therefore, the biggest risk we face is not a decline in resources, but rather a decline in quality and standards – and a collapse of morale.
Someone seems to have decided that not only should we have funding cut, we should also be controlled centrally, and the inevitable effect of this is that the sense of innovation and initiative that propelled Irish universities to excellence will be lost.
This matters more than just maintaining a good atmosphere in this country’s colleges. What is at stake is our capacity to restore our economic growth; if we fail to demonstrate global excellence in our higher education institutions, we will not get the kind of inward investment we now need.
In fact, the IDA has emphasised repeatedly of late that a research culture, backed by world-class universities, is a vital ingredient in our ability as a country to attract new investment.
Operating a world-class university is an expensive business. I don’t just mean it costs a lot of money to do cutting-edge research; offering quality teaching is not cheap. We don’t just need state-of-the-art science labs, we also need teaching in the humanities that makes use of new insights and makes students familiar with new multimedia tools. We need to show the world that Ireland can offer an education to students that is as good as, and better than, anyone else’s. If we can’t, why should they invest here?
So what should be the answer?
Although I have a lot of sympathy with those who don’t like the idea of tuition fees, we have to be realistic and accept that unless we reintroduce fees we are doomed to have a second- rate higher education system, which will soon be offering second-rate degrees. The money needed to secure real excellence and quality is well beyond the capacity (or at any rate the willingness) of the taxpayer to deliver. Even during the Celtic Tiger’s good years we were seriously underfunded, and now we are about to have our resources decimated.
And why are we refusing to adopt the obvious solution? Because we have decided that the principle of offering money to wealthy people to educate their children is more important than the quality of the education that all the students get.
Nobody is arguing that those who are less well off should pay fees. In fact, I would undertake that my university would never turn away anyone because they couldn’t afford fees. But there is now a clear imperative that those who can afford it should make a contribution, and that for those whose capacity may be in doubt other supports such as genuine grants and loans should be available.
I think we have known all this for a while. But now, at the end of this week, we find out that Fianna Fáil and the Greens have decided there will be no fees. No fees, and I suspect, no more money either (indeed, probably less). So now, in these harder times, we are going to focus our declining funds on helping the wealthy, while neglecting the disadvantaged and asset stripping the colleges. It’s not the way to go.
-Ferdinand von Prondzynski is president of Dublin City University
