Time to confront new reality in colleges

THIRD-LEVEL college leaders have repeatedly warned that the current funding model is unsustainable and will negatively influence colleges’ ability to maintain or improve educational standards.

The news that third-level institutions will have to, in just over 10 years, cope with more than 45,000 extra students each year adds urgency to the need to make some hard, probably divisive decisions.

In an ideal world, everyone would have free access to education but, as Mattie Ross observed in the Cohen brothers’ classic-in-waiting True Grit, “there’s nothing free in this world but the grace of God”.