A NEW student loan scheme should be introduced “urgently” to address the financial crisis facing higher education, according to a Government-commissioned report on the future of third-level education.
The Hunt report, due to be considered by Cabinet shortly, recommends that students “contribute to the cost of their education” by receiving a loan to cover the cost of fees.
This would have to be repaid once they had reached a certain income threshold after graduating.
The Government is under increasing pressure from university heads to reintroduce fees to allow them to cope with record student numbers and meet demands that they play a greater role in economic recovery.
The report, the most comprehensive analysis of higher education in a generation, calls for an overhaul of institutes of technology, closer monitoring of the workload of academic staff and the creation of “clusters’’ of excellence between colleges.
New details of the proposed student loan scheme have emerged as almost 58,000 students received their Leaving Certificate exam results yesterday.
Although the expert group, chaired by economist Dr Colin Hunt, recommends “that an income-contingent loan facility for student fees be introduced urgently”, it does not specify the income threshold or the scale of tuition charges.
Sources say the expert group believes this is a matter for Government. The Hunt report outlines the financial pressures on the third-level sector, which faces an unprecedented 30 per cent surge in student numbers over the next decade.
It says the huge dependence of colleges on State funding is unsustainable in the longer term, and that non-State funding is urgently required.
It also raises the possibility that some major employers should play a more active role in supporting specific higher-education programmes.
The recommendations from the Hunt report will put pressure on the Green Party to explain how to fund the sector in the absence of new tuition charges.
The Greens have vetoed any change to the free fees scheme in the revised programme for government, and Minister for Education Mary Coughlan told The Irish Times last night that this agreement was seen in the Coalition as non-negotiable.
Other key recommendations in the Hunt report include:
that 14 institutes of technology could be redesignated as technology universities, provided strict quality assurances were provided;
part-time students – currently ineligible for maintenance grants and required to pay fees – should gain the same entitlements as full-time students;
a new workload management system both in universities and the institutes of technology would be more closely monitored;
much closer collaboration is required between colleges to help create “clusters’’ of excellence; and
an expanded role should be considered for the Higher Education Authority in managing the sector and linking spending to national objectives.
Ms Coughlan has also ruled out an increase in the €1,500 student registration charge this year, while she is more circumspect about an increase in 2011.
