It costs the taxpayer some £4,830 a year for each student in full-time third-level education. That amounts to a lot of money when multiplied by the ever-increasing number of young people who now go on to study at universities and ITs. Yet, until relatively recently, the number of young people who do not finish third-level courses was not known, except anecdotally, and the wastage involved still has not been quantified.

The Commission on the Points System reported this month that the study it commissioned of third-level attrition showed that some 26 per cent of students who start a higher education course drop out for one or more reasons.

The problem is not a particularly Irish one. Figures for some other European countries show that a similar number of students drop out of college and in the US the figure is almost double our level. However, because of the importance which Irish people have always been believed to place on a good education, it was not considered that the drop-put rate here would be quite so high.

Indeed, the possibility, no longer discounted, that more than one-third of students who start courses in ITs do not finish, is quite startling. In the past, colleges themselves did not help identify or quantify the problem either - presumably the stigma of having a high drop-out rate would affect chances of attracting students.

However, studies like that carried out for the Points Commission and by Anne Carpenter in Carlow IT and featured in these pages, have begun to put the problem in perspective, although much work still needs to be done. It's good to learn that the study which the Higher Education Authority has commissioned is to place as much emphasis on the reasons why students drop out, as on the actual numbers dropping out.

ThE reasons undoubtedly are many and complex. However, most work to date points to a lack of information on courses and lack of preparation for higher education as important factors. It's amazing in this day and age, with all the written and computerised information available, that sufficient details of the various courses and colleges still are not getting through to students.

And it's obvious that with more and better career guidance in second-level schools, preparation for college could be improved radically. With massive investment in other areas of education, it's ridiculous that only 250 of the State's second-level schools have the services of at least one full-time equivalent guidance counsellor and that schools with an enrolment of between 250 and 499 pupils have the services of only a halftime counsellor, while those with 1,000 pupils qualify for just two counsellors. With the best will in the world, counsellors cannot be expected in these circumstances to cover all the ground they would wish. It's about time that the ratio of counsellors to pupils dropped nearer the ideal of 1:250.

Given the high cost of providing third-level education for our young people, it's not good enough to let the present situation continue.

Education & Living

Editor: Ella Shanahan Production: Hugh Lambert and Harry Browne Main cover illustration: Tom Mathews Small cover illustrations: Cathy Dineen Email: education@irish-times.ie