Mary Mitchell O'Connor (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It would be difficult to extend the student support scheme to private colleges without also making provision for other supports such as the free fees, the student assistance fund and the fund for students with disabilities. These costs are not factored into the estimated €17 million figure. This is an estimate of the likely cost of extending the student support scheme but there is a difficulty in accurately estimating the costs involved. The Higher Education Authority does not collate data from private colleges. The Department is, therefore, reliant on information provided by the colleges themselves, or by HECA.

The fifth recommendation proposes that students enrolled in private colleges should be entitled to access the student assistance fund. The student assistance fund, SAF, was established in 1994 and is part funded by the European Social Fund. It provides financial assistance to students experiencing financial difficulties while attending third level education. Students can be assisted towards their rent, child care costs, transports costs and books or class materials. The SAF is open to full-time registered students on courses of not less than one year’s duration leading to an undergraduate or postgraduate qualification, with €1 million of this funding ring-fenced for part-time students from the target groups from 2018. There were some 15,700 students who benefitted from the SAF in 2015-16 at a cost of €7.84 million. The purpose of the SAF is to support full-time higher education students who are experiencing financial hardship while they study in publicly funded institutions. It is important to note that if the SAF was to be extended to private colleges without student grants also being made available there is the potential for considerably higher demand for it than is the case in existing institutions.In effect the student assistance fund, SAF, would become a proxy student grant scheme, which it is not resourced for.

The policy of providing free fees and grant aid to students in publicly-funded colleges and tax relief on fees paid in both public and approved private colleges is a long-established feature in Ireland. The criteria that a higher education institution has to meet to be considered an approved institution for student grant funding purposes are outlined in section 7 of the Student Support Act 2011. The student grant scheme has a statutory basis. To qualify for student supports under the scheme, students must be attending an approved programme at an approved institution. The list of institutions is outlined each year in the student support regulations which provide the necessary detail about a number of issues that are provided for in the Act. In 2017, the Department of Education and Skills will spend approximately €450 million on a range of access measures for further and higher education students. This includes approximately €390 million on student grants and related activities, which is expected to benefit approximately 80,000 students.

Further funding for the higher education sector is a key concern of Government. The reality of the economic situation and the public expenditure corrections which had to be made in recent years presented challenges across all areas of public expenditure, including higher education. In recognition of the resulting funding pressures in the higher education sector, an expert group chaired by Peter Cassells was established to examine funding arrangements for higher education and to identify a range of approaches that, combined, will achieve a sustainable funding base. The Cassells report was published in July 2016 and clearly outlines the funding challenges being experienced in the sector, across capital, current and student support expenditure. The report highlighted the need for additional funding of €600 million per annum by 2021 and €1 billion per annum by 2030 to both keep pace with rising student demographics and to improve quality through reducing the staff to student ratio from the current 20:1 to 14:1.