A meeting will be held in Dublin today to discuss the cost of third-level education
Higher Education Minister James Lawless is holding a 'cost of education' meeting in Croke Park.
Students, their unions, apprentices, colleges and further education institutions will all be attending the event.
It comes after the Minister said there would be no more once-off cuts to college fees this year.
In recent years, a €1000 reduction had been applied to the student contribution fee to help with the cost of living, but Minister Lawless says Government is trying to move away from that kind of financial help.
Calls for fees to be scrapped
Despite the Minister's comments, the Union of Students in Ireland is still calling for fees to be completely scrapped.
It's a measure that was included in the list of promises from politicians made in the lead up to the general election last year.
Nathan Murphy, Vice President for Campaigns in USI, will be at the event today. He says they've already been having positive conversations with the Higher Education Minister, but help is needed for students in other areas too:
"Just last year there was around 40,000 students that applied for on-campus accommodation and were turned away. You hear stories of students in fifth year of secondary school looking for accommodation currently.
We need to actually see developments that have been announced, such as the likes of DCU and Maynooth actually going ahead and breaking ground on that. We need to see technological universities being able to borrow money from the government to actually build this student accommodation".
Nathan says the housing crisis is the biggest barrier to third-level education at the minute, and it needs to be addressed.
Speaking ahead of the meeting today, Minister James Lawless said:
“My goal for this consultation event will be to identify how to ease financial pressures for all students across all sectors. My Department is focused on ensuring that education is accessible to all. I am hopeful that the discussion will generate constructive, practical proposals for consideration as we examine the options to support students during the budgetary process.”
Around 150 people are expected to attend the event.
