Averil Power (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their presentations. I have a few questions to pick up, in a little more detail, on some of the issues others have raised. In the opening presentation, Professor Brown said 3% is the current figure on online earning. Does he have a breakdown of the number of those which are part-time and which are full-time courses?

One of the biggest difficulties with part-time education in general is part-time fees. The whole education structure is designed around people who have and can afford the time to be in college during the day. That is a general obstacle in part-time education. However, I have the impression that most part-time education is in-the-room education. This cannot be just about the funding model because part-time education is, in the main, paid for by companies or by the students themselves. There must be something more than State funding influencing this. State funding pushes people into full-time rather than part-time education at the undergraduate end. I am wondering what the other obstacles are apart from funding and the State funding model which I agree should be neutral as to the hours of delivery. It should be more concerned about content and what a person is getting out of a course than the hours. What are the other obstacles? What is stopping colleges from providing more part-time courses online?

The other questions are on the scope for online learning. I take the point Professor Savage made about not requiring all of our courses to be 100% online or 100% classroom based. It is about changing the way we deliver education and having courses that are a blend of each. I wonder if there is a difference in a first time undergraduate experience and a postgraduate experience. There is something good, from a student's point of view, to being on campus. I know from my education in Trinity and as a postgraduate student in DCU, doing the first undergraduate course, I learned more from being around the place, taking part in events and societies and things like that and from being in a learning community than from what was on the course. There is something to having that type of undergraduate experience, particularly in the first instance. It is different for people who are 40, 50 or 60 years of age and wish to get an educational qualification. They might not be able to afford to be on campus. However, I think there is something special for an 18, 19 or 20 year old student to actually be in a physical learning environment. Is the online option seen as a better one for adult learners and is there an undergraduate-postgraduate distinction?

The presentation on the Open University was interesting. It was mentioned that 30% of the undergraduates do not meet the typical higher education entry criteria. This is very interesting because the completion rates are said to be good. What supports are provided to ensure this is the case? Some of the universities have expressed concern about students who get on to certain courses with low points and then struggle, for instance in science courses in some colleges. These students struggle to keep up with the content. There is a lot of attrition in first year in some colleges because of this. How does the Open University manage to get students who do not have a Leaving Certificate level of education manage to support them and get them out at the other end?