Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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Question 288: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the number of full-time and part-time mature students that withdrew from higher education courses for each of the years 2004, 2005, 2006 and to date in 2007 in tabular readable form. [30158/07]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The information available on overall retention or survival rates for all students in higher education indicates that Ireland performs well by international comparison. The OECD published 'Education at a Glance 2007' contains estimates of 'tertiary survival' for each OECD member state based on the estimated proportion of new entrants in a given year who successfully completed a tertiary programme a number of years later. The latest published data refer to 2004.

On average in OECD counties, 30% of Honours Bachelor Degree programme (Tertiary-Type A) students fail to successfully complete these programmes. Ireland has the second highest retention rate of all OECD countries for these programmes, at 83%. Retention rates for Higher Certificate/ Ordinary Bachelor Degree students (Tertiary-Type B) were, on average, lower than those for Honours Bachelor Degree programmes. In Ireland the retention rate was 69% compared to an OECD average of 62%. Ireland's strong relative performance on these fronts reflects the priority that has been given to supporting retention initiatives across higher education institutions in recent years.

Specific data on the numbers of mature students withdrawing from higher education courses are not currently available in this Department or the Higher Education Authority.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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Question 289: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the number of full-time and part-time mature students that were enrolled on higher education courses for each of the years 2004 to 2007 in tabular readable form. [30159/07]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The information sought by the Deputy is not readily available in the form requested. The Higher Education Authority undertake periodic studies of the profile of the student population in higher education to facilitate the analysis of overall long term trends in relation to the participation of students by age, gender, field of study, educational achievement, and socio-economic background. The latest published report 'Who Went to College in 2004? A National Survey of New Entrants to Higher Education' was published in 2006 and is based on a national survey of all those who enrolled as new entrants to higher education in October 2004. The study showed that the number of mature new entrants (those aged 23 and over), as a proportion of overall new entrants, had risen from 5% in 1998 to 9.4% in 2004. This indicates that targets set out in the Report of the Action Group on Access to Third Level Education (2001), that mature students would represent 10% of all new entrants by 2006, were being met ahead of schedule. Encouraging enhanced participation in higher education among mature students, on a full and part-time basis, continues to be a priority for the Government in line with the objectives for upskilling set out in the National Skills Strategy, jointly launched by the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment and I earlier this year.

I will arrange to forward a copy of the full HEA publication to the Deputy for his information.