Results 10,741-10,760 of 45,539 for speaker:Simon Harris

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The CAO is a company established by Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to process applications for undergraduate, and some postgraduate, courses on their behalf. Decisions on admissions are made by the HEIs who then instruct the CAO to make offers to successful candidates. Therefore application and offer data is held by the CAO, not by my Department. According to data released by the...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Student Support Schemes (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The HEAR and DARE schemes are operated by the Irish Universities Association (IUA) who set the policy criteria for the schemes. Admissions under the schemes are regulated by the higher education institutions themselves. Each institution determines its own admissions policy in relation to the schemes, the number of places they reserve and the allocation of those places. Applications to both...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The decision on eligibility for a student grant is a matter, in the first instance, for the centralised student grant awarding authority SUSI (Student Universal Support Ireland) to determine. For the 2020/21 academic year, student grant applications will be assessed based on gross income from all sources for the period 1st January 2019 to 31st December 2019. However, if a student or...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Further and Higher Education (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The student grant scheme, administered by SUSI, provides maintenance grants to students who meet the prescribed conditions of funding, including those relating to nationality, residency, previous academic attainment and means. Student maintenance grants are payable at either the adjacent or non-adjacent rate. The distance to be measured is the shortest non-tolled most direct route from the...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Further and Higher Education (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The student grant scheme, administered by SUSI, provides maintenance grants to students who meet the prescribed conditions of funding, including those relating to nationality, residency, previous academic attainment and means. Student maintenance grants are payable at either the adjacent or non-adjacent rate. The distance to be measured is the shortest non-tolled most direct route from the...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are autonomous with regard to management of their academic affairs including admissions procedures. The CAO process applications for undergraduate courses on behalf of the HEIs Decisions on admissions, including deadlines for submission of applications or acceptance of offers, are made by the HEIs who then instruct the CAO to make offers to successful...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: I propose to take Questions Nos. 607 and 616 together. The HPAT is independently administered by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) on behalf of the universities’ medical schools and the RCSI. The selection criteria and process for admission to medical schools is a matter for those institutions in line with their statutory autonomy in relation to academic...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: At the time of closing the appeal application process on Wednesday 16September, some 12,300 students had appealed almost 33,700 grades. Every effort will be made to process appeals as quickly as possible but I am informed it is not possible at this time for the Department of Education to commit to a date for the issue of the appeal results. Students will be notified of this date as soon as...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: English language education (ELE) in Ireland is a broad and diverse sector with the vast majority of activity undertaken by private sector providers. I am aware of the challenges that are being encountered in the ELE sector and the substantial impact that the Covid-19 outbreak has had on its students, teachers and providers. As part of the response to the pandemic, my Department established a...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The CAO is a company established by Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to process applications for undergraduate, and some postgraduate, courses on their behalf. Decisions on admissions are made by the HEIs who then instruct the CAO to make offers to successful candidates. Therefore application and offer data is held by the CAO, not by my Department and the data requested by the Deputy...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Third Level Admissions (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: In order to help mitigate the impact of the changes to the Leaving Certificate system, I announced the creation of an additional 2,225 places on high-demand courses in Higher Education Institutions. These places have resulted in the highest ever number of applicants receiving a CAO offers, with 53,815 CAO applicants receiving round one offers on Friday 11th September. While the subject areas...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: Universities and Institutes of Technology determine their own procedures for admission. The CAO process applications for undergraduate, and some postgraduate, courses on their behalf. Decisions on admissions are made by the Higher Education Institutions who then instruct the CAO to make offers to successful candidates. Neither I nor my Department have a role in the operation of the CAO....

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The Higher Education Authority (HEA) is responsible for collecting, analysing and disseminating student and graduate data from all HEA-funded higher education institutions (HEIs). Data for the number of students enrolled in medicine courses for the academic period 2007/2008 to 2018/2019 is attached. Data in relation to enrolments in the 2019/2020 academic year is currently being returned by...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Student Support Schemes (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The main support available to students is the statutory based Student Grant Scheme where students are studying for the first time or are progressing to study at a higher level e.g. progressing to postgraduate study. To qualify for grant support, a student has to meet various criteria such as means, residency, nationality and progression. The decision on eligibility for a student grant is a...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: State Examinations (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The CAO is a company established by Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to process applications for undergraduate, and some postgraduate, courses on their behalf. Decisions on admissions are made by the HEIs who then instruct the CAO to make offers to successful candidates. Therefore application and offer data is held by the CAO, not by my Department. According to data released by the...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Further and Higher Education (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The CAO process applications for undergraduate courses on behalf of the Higher Education Institutions. Decisions on admissions are made by the HEIs who then instruct the CAO to make offers to successful candidates. As such, neither I nor my Department have a role in the operation of the CAO, and it is not with my remit to issue direction to the CAO with regard to any application. I...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: The Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science allocates recurrent funding to the Higher Education Authority (HEA) for direct disbursement to HEA designated higher education institutions. This includes grants to cover the tuition fees, excluding the student contributions element, for undergraduate students eligible under the terms of the Free Fees Initiative...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Further and Higher Education (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: Students pursuing GEM programmes do so as second degree courses and consequently are not eligible for free fees funding or for student grants. However, in order to widen access to GEM programmes, and give assistance towards the financial burden on each student pursuing these programmes, the fees of participating EU students are partly subsidised by the State via the Higher Education Authority...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Scientific Research (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: Associate membership of CERN is possible at a cost of 10% of the indicative full membership annual cost. This equates to an association membership cost of €1.25 million per annum. The benefits as well as the costs are restricted with this option. Associate members can choose to join at a higher rate, bringing a commensurate increase in the potential return to Ireland. With associate...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Student Support Schemes (22 Sep 2020)

Simon Harris: Under the terms of the student grant scheme, grant assistance is awarded to students who meet the prescribed conditions of funding including those which relate to nationality, residency, previous academic attainment and means. The nationality requirements for the student grant scheme are set out in section 14 of the Student Support Act 2011 and regulation 5 of the Student Support Regulations...