Fees

filmbuffboy

Hi everyone! Im looking for any advice/opinions/facts/speculation on the touchy subject of reintrouduction of college fees. Ive been hearing a lot of contradictive info of late and was wondering if anyone knows of a website of source of info with cold hard FACTS on the matter & not hearsay. Ive heard that fees may only be reintroduced for school leavers & it would not affect mature students. Is this true? Reagardless of whether it is or not what kind of figures are we looking at fees wise when education may not be free anymore?

lasair

the news til now is......

fees will more than likely be introduced next year...basically none this yr but you will have to fork it out next year... You can get a full info on fees from uni website but for science you are lookin at approx €8,000 as this yr its €7774 for 4th yr....

barry181091

€74 grand for 4th year, god I hope thats a typo !

leeroybrown

The bad news is that you won't find many facts out there at the moment. All that the Dept. of Education and Minister for Education are doing right now is using the press to make them socially 'acceptable'. Until actual proposals go through the Dáil no one outside a select few government figures will really be able to answer your questions.

The current known information is:

• Fees are relatively likely to return for the 2010/2011 academic term.
• There has been no confirmation of the method but a loan system with an income threshold seems to be the preferred option.
• Students who are completing a course that they started prior to this academic year won't be charged fees. This is due to the concept of 'legitimate expectation'. Essentially, by signing up to a course with free fees the student gains a 'legitimate expectation' in the eyes of the law that they will be able to complete the course with free fees.
• The HEA have instructed all Universities/Colleges to inform all students registering to start a course this academic year that fees may return next year. Again, this is due to 'legitimate expectation'. By telling students this prior to registration they should be able to charge these students fees next year.

Regarding the size of the fees themselves, the best rough guide is probably to look at NUIG Fees Office fee schedule. These are the EU fees that are currently charged by the University for a student from Ireland attending NUIG. For example an Engineering student currently costs €8092 (€6368 tuition paid by government + €1500 non tuition + €224 levy) per year. In reality I'd expect the fees to go up slightly as the Universities will probably try to take a slice of the pie too.

Sorry if this is lacking in links to websites but quite frankly there's very little out there that's authoritative and worth linking to.

nobbo

leeroybrown wrote: »

• The HEA have instructed all Universities/Colleges to inform all students registering to start a course this academic year that fees may return next year. Again, this is due to 'legitimate expectation'. By telling students this prior to registration they should be able to charge these students fees next year.

I have already registered as an NUIG student and at no point of the process was I informed that i would be liable to pay full fees.

narwog81

nobbo wrote: »

I have already registered as an NUIG student and at no point of the process was I informed that i would be liable to pay full fees.

lawsuit!!! even if you weren't officially informed im sure the college would be able to argue that no student entering third level in 2009/10 was unaware of the possibility of fees being re-introduced

nobbo

narwog81 wrote: »

lawsuit!!! even if you weren't officially informed im sure the college would be able to argue that no student entering third level in 2009/10 was unaware of the possibility of fees being re-introduced

I could just as easily say that I do not watch the news, read the newspaper or listen to the radio.

narwog81

nobbo wrote: »

I could just as easily say that I do not watch the news, read the newspaper or listen to the radio.

or not interact with any of your first year peer group.

or check your college email when the SU send bulletins with information about fees around.

or frequent internet discussion boards, they're not that anonymous you know!:D

lasair

oops my bad its was a typo and corrected..late night typing...sorry

nobbo

narwog81 wrote: »

or not interact with any of your first year peer group.

or check your college email when the SU send bulletins with information about fees around.

or frequent internet discussion boards, they're not that anonymous you know!:D

But I havnt started college so Ive had no contact with SU yet however Im a registered student who has been told that all I had to pay was 1724 and did so.:rolleyes: