Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 15 January 2019
376. Deputy Pearse Doherty asked the Minister for Education and Skills the measures being taken to promote equality of opportunity in higher education; the efforts being made to remove barriers to accessing higher education and to promote greater participation by those under-represented in the sector; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1560/19]
View answerThe National Access Plan for Equity of Access to Higher Education 2015-2019 (NAP) was launched in December 2015, and it aims to ensure that the student body entering, participating in and completing higher education at all levels reflects the diversity and social mix of Ireland’s population. Irish Travellers are identified as a target group within the Plan.
To support the implementation of the National Access Plan (NAP), the Department of Education and Skills (DES) established the Programme for Access to Higher Education (PATH) fund in 2016. Through PATH the Government committed more than €16 million over three years to increase access to higher education by the target groups identified in the NAP and will see many new initiatives emerge that will support greater levels of access and participation.
I recently published a Progress Review of the NAP in which it has been recommended that the terms of the National Access Plan be extended by two years to 2021. This is necessary to allow for the implementation of the Access Data Plan and to ensure that the targets for the new National Access Plan are set based on the new data. Sufficient time needs to be provided for baseline data to be collected and verified. An extension of the term would also enable initiative such as PATH to be more fully implemented and evaluated, and allow learning outcomes to be used to inform the next National Access Plan.
The Department also provides a suite of supports costing in the region of €400 million that are intended to assist students from disadvantaged backgrounds, and other under-represented groups, to overcome financial barriers to accessing and completing Further and Higher Education. These supports include the student grants, the fund for students with disabilities, the student assistant fund and a number of bursary schemes.
The annual core grant allocation by the HEA to each higher education institution includes an access funding element which is based on the number of students from access target groups who are participating in each institution as derived from the return of annual student data by each institution to the HEA.
