This week, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform produced a report concluding that increasing student fees to €4,000 year would not be sufficient to plug the higher education funding gap – a gap that is only worsening and which recently saw a state body claim could have “serious and irretrievable implications” for the “future sustainability” of third-level institutions.
The ongoing funding problem in Irish higher education is serious and urgent, and the options presented for solving it – whether that’s student loans or a fully state-funded system – represent different ideological positions on the solution. Those opposed to a system of increased fees fear that even a small increase in fees now will result in more increases over time. Indeed, that is precisely what happened with the student contribution charge, and what seems to already be suggested with this latest report.
It would be one thing if we could point to a magic figure that would fix the system, leaving it world-class. But a glance at the higher education system across the Irish Sea suggests that this number does not exist, or is simply extortionately high. The issues that plague the Irish system continue to damage the English system, despite student fees of £9,000 a year – the highest figure in the EU.
Just this week, lecturers across the UK, with the University and College Union, took industrial action over a pay dispute, prompted by the decline in their pay since 2009, the precarious nature of academic work and the pay gap between genders. Not only do these issues persist despite the size of their student fees, but many are the result of taking the wrong approach to supporting the work of a university, not just a lack of funding. The allure of raising fees becomes a crutch that accommodates stagnant institutions and allows operating costs to soar.
Forcing students to step in and pay when the government is not willing is not only unfair, but unlikely to solve many of the problems that are crippling the sector. Too many of these problems cannot simply be fixed by throwing money at them.
