Students could have earlier decisions on applications for college grants this year as a result of improvements to the €375m scheme.

LEAVING Cert students around the country are currently in the middle of the oral and practical exams that precede the main event in June. With so much attention on these, it would be easy to let paperwork slide, writes Gráinne McGuinness

The student grants system that caused “chaos” when set up four years ago has lost so much money it would risk being closed down if it was a private company, the chair of a Dáil group has claimed.

A married woman has been told her college grant application has to be assessed on the income of her parents who she no longer lives with.

Officials overseeing the centralised student grant system have been forced to extend the application deadline for those seeking the support after an embarrassing technical ‘crash’.

The son of Irish emigrants, John Brennan was this week announced as Obama’s choice to head up the CIA. Caroline O’Doherty investigates

The central grants system may not be able to cope when it is extended to cover all students in the coming years, claims the head of the institute of technology sector.

The difficulties surrounding new arrangements for sanctioning and delivering a third of student grants suggests once again that our public service finds change more difficult than they should.