Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for her question.

At this stage of the project lifecycle it is not possible to give a timeframe for the development of a College of the Future for Cavan Institute.

Completed preliminary business cases including that of Cavan Monaghan ETB were submitted to SOLAS by the deadline of last Friday, the 12th of January.

The next stage of the process is for these business cases to be evaluated under criteria such as value for money, affordability and strategic policy and priority alignment. Cavan Monaghan ETB will be informed of the outcome of this evaluation process once it is completed.

The Deputy will know when I visited Cavan Institute, I made it clear this would take some time to achieve but when completed, this will be a significant boost for Cavan and the region.

It will consolidate existing rented accommodation and will accommodate 1,000 students in order to future-proof the provision of accommodation for Cavan Institute for the next 50+ years.

The new college campus will be complementary to and work in collaboration with the existing FET provision in Cavan Town, to further strengthen the provision of FET programmes at Levels 5 and 6, as well as delivering on apprenticeships.

Other exciting initiatives included in the proposal are higher education programmes in partnership with higher education institutes and part-time programmes.

This will be transformational for Cavan and I look forward to working with Deputy Smyth and Deputies from across the House to deliver this important project.