Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 22 June 2021
459. Deputy Rose Conway-Walsh asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science the number of members of the Traveller community participating in higher education in each year since 2015; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32989/21]
View answerThe number of Traveller students in higher education comes from the Equal Access Survey which is an annual voluntary set of questions asked of all first-year undergraduate new entrant students to HEA funded higher education institutions. Gathering accurate data on Irish Traveller participation is difficult and is influenced by varying response rates to the survey.
In 2020, the HEA carried out a review on the number of Irish Travellers participating in Higher Education. This review involved the analysis of all enrolments from the Student Record System and linking these back to the Equal Access Survey records for each cohort of new entrants. The findings of the review show that in
- 2015/2016, 100 Travellers participated in higher education of which 30 were new entrants;
- 2016/2017, 103 Travellers participated in higher education of which 32 were new entrants;
- 2017/2018, 118 Travellers participated in higher education of which 50 were new entrants.
- Due to GDPR issues, Traveller data is not available for the 2018/2019 academic year;
- Using a similar methodology to the review, in 2019/2020, 110 students were identified as Travellers, of which 48 were identified as new entrants. It is important to note that due to missing data in 2018/19, figures for 2019/20 onwards may underestimate the number of Traveller students in the system over the next few years.
Irish Travellers are a target group of the National Access Plan 2015 – 2021. It is important that all efforts are made to ensure we have accurate and up-to-date record of the number of Traveller students in higher education as we commence the development of the next National Access Plan 2022 – 2026.
