Bad planning, outsourcing core services with no contract, and inadequate staffing contributed to student grants agency SUSI’s disastrous first year of operations that cost €5.9m — more than three times its budget.

Future careers in dance and music could be under threat from budget cuts of hundreds of teaching posts on further education courses.

A woman who got a job after returning to education in her early 40s fears that cuts at the college she studied at will deprive others of the same chance.