Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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556. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if students who are educated in the North of Ireland and who undertake A level examinations, yet who reside in the South of Ireland, will be accepted onto the higher education access route admissions scheme, when applying through the Central Applications Office for college places for autumn 2015; if her attention has been drawn to the fact that hundreds of students from the South attend school in the Six Counties, and would hugely benefit from participation in the scheme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [8211/15]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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The Higher Education Access Route (HEAR) is a college and university admissions scheme which offers places on reduced points and extra college support to school leavers from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds.

The scheme is operated by a number of higher education institutions and not by my Department. Admissions to the institutions are regulated by the institutions themselves.

I have been informed by the HEAR/DARE Steering Group that HEAR was developed to target students from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds attending secondary school (i.e. sitting the Irish Leaving Certificate) and residing in the Republic of Ireland. HEAR is the primary mechanism through which participating HEIs reach national targets, identified by the Higher Education Authority (based on Republic of Ireland data and research), which points to particular socio-economic groups being under-represented relative to their share of the Republic of Ireland's population as a whole.

The six indicators employed by HEAR to identify eligible students are all Republic of Ireland proxies for long-term socio-economic disadvantage. Consequently students educated and resident outside the Republic of Ireland cannot meet the eligibility criteria for the HEAR scheme. This policy was agreed by all participating HEAR institutions when HEAR was established in 2009. It is acknowledged that there is an anomaly regarding students who are for example, resident in the Republic of Ireland and attending secondary school in Northern Ireland and sitting A-Levels. This has been brought to the attention of the DARE HEAR Steering Group and National Policy Group. This will not result in any changes to the HEAR scheme for students applying for entry in 2015 as the terms, conditions and criteria for application were published in August 2014. To date no correspondence or complaint has been received (by the DARE HEAR Shared Services Unit or HEAR HEIs) from third level applicants or parents of applicants residing in Northern Ireland or the border counties on this matter, or from any schools in Northern Ireland. The position of A-Level applicants resident in the Republic of Ireland will be reviewed for those students applying to higher education in 2016.

Individual students who have queries on this matter can contact HEAR Higher Education Institutions directly. The Deputy may wish to contact the Irish Universities Association in this instance.