Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Deputy McConalogue covered most of the areas in which we are interested. Could the witness perhaps profile the type of student who accesses the courses? Is it an older student returning to education? It would be interesting to know if they are people who are changing careers or people who are out of work and seeking to return to employment. Using the facility to learn online is much easier for them than going to a college, particularly if one has been out of education for a long time. Sometimes returning to a college setting can be a little daunting and it might suit to do the course online. I am interested in hearing about the type of student involved as well as the number of students. The outstanding figure for me is that the college is producing between 35% and 40% of all newly qualified primary teachers. That is a huge number for a single institution to produce. There is also the issue of supply and demand. One of the criticisms levelled at Hibernia College is that it produces too many teachers when the demand does not exist. How would the witness respond to such charges?

Obviously, there are huge advantages to e-learning. Are there any disadvantages to learning solely online in terms of the personal development between teachers and students? Are there areas where it can be improved but the technology has not yet caught up with what the college wants to do? It would be interesting to hear how the college envisages the e-learning experience developing over the next ten years.