Mark Ward
Question:1144. Deputy Mark Ward asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science the estimated cost to extend the SUSI grant to part-time college courses. [63170/21]
View answerWednesday, 19 January 2022
Questions (1144)
Written answers
During the 2020/2021 academic year, statistics from the Higher Education Authority show that there were 49,658 students studying at all levels in our publicly funded institutions on a part time basis.
The costs of extending the SUSI grant scheme to these part time students would depend on an assessment to see if they meet the prescribed conditions of funding, including those which relate to course mode, nationality, residency, previous academic attainment (progression) and means. As they have not been assessed under the SUSI scheme, we do not know how many of these students would be eligible to receive SUSI grant funding if they were eligible to apply.
However the following will give you an indication of estimated costs of extending the SUSI scheme to these part time students:
- If 10,000 of these students were deemed eligible, we would estimate a cost of €46m
- If 20,000 of these students were deemed eligible, we would estimate a cost of €92m
- If 30,000 of these students were deemed eligible, we would estimate a cost of €138m
- If all 49,658 of these students were deemed eligible for funding, we would estimate the cost to be €228m
These estimates are based on the average fee and maintenance grant received by eligible full time students under the SUSI grant scheme and do not include an estimation of extending funding to part time students under the free fees initiative which would be an additional cost to the exchequer.