Students4Change has obtained a variety of data through Freedom of Information Act (FOI) requests over the years and we have created a database of them for public consumption. We believe that open access to information leads to transparency, which means accountability, and accountability means better-run and more democratic organizations. The information we share is also useful for student leaders to advocate in committees or to agitate or for journalists to research.
The FOIs relate to a wide variety of topics, and everybody is welcome to add more. There are about 70 or so FOIs. A large chunk of them relate to Trinity, some to other universities, and some to the government. recent additions include empty properties, disqualification of Professor Sarah Alyn-Stacey, outsourcing, investments and use of animals as experimentation subjects and HEA Bill-related content. The most interesting recent FOI we have is on how all HEIs across Ireland used the mental health funds from the HEA, and how Trinity and UCD specifically used them.
HEA Mental Health Funds
Disqualification of Professor Sarah Alyn-Stacey (TCD)
Live animal experimentation (TCD)
Rent and Fee Arrears Across All Third-Level Institutions in Ireland
Casualization statistics TCD
Outsourcing (including in TCD and NUIG)
Empty properties TCD
Attempted casual pay cuts in 2019 TCD
Cheating statistics during Covid-19 and before TCD
Partnerships with China
School budgeting explanatory booklet from 2018 TCD
Complaints re. employment status TCD
Counselling waiting times TCD
Investments and endowment fund TCD and UCD, including specific partnerships for research funding re. fossil fuels
Minister Harris correspondence re. exams and memos and USI meetings
Minister Harris’ briefing documents for USI meetings
Minister Harris HEA Bill 2022
Minister Harris correspondance. re sexual harrasment reporting procedures in UCD
Junior Dean statistics TCD
Non disclosure agreements TCD
RDS Costs TCD
Rent and Fee Debt, Dropouts TCD
Staff Numbers TCD
Drop out rates during Covid-19 TCD
Travel costs TCD
Students removed due to sexual harrasment allegations TCD
The plan of the government for third-level education is abysmal. Firstly, there is no commitment to reducing the student fees. Secondly, the funding is less than half of what our universities need. Thirdly, the plan comes with strings attached through the HEA Bill 2022, which is essentially a government takeover to control academia.
Not only does the plan not include a reduction in the student fees, the state is taking over academia. In the over 300-page bill, the “Minister” is mentioned 321 times. He holds sway over universities’ equality policy. The same cabinet that is gifting away the National Maternity Hospital to the church will now hold this power. He approves the budget of universities. The same neoliberal government that has decimated funding for our universities will now be able to control its finances. He will handpick people on governing bodies of universities. The same academic voices who are now dissenting will be finally muzzled.
It is a crisis that the government themselves have created, and are now stepping in as saviours to fix it. They will not. They will further push their disastrous neoliberal agenda down our throats.
Students and staff on the ground will be the most affected. The government promised no student loan system, but they cannot be trusted. They are playing the long game. Now that they will control academia, their policies cannot be stopped. We will be pushed to precarity.
In line with government policy, there is not a single mention of mental health funding within the plan. Who controls the money will control the policy. Small courses will be cut. Programmes will be merged. Academics will lose their jobs.
We would like to ask you to support the ongoing petition campaign by Students4Change and the Graduate Students’ Union of Trinity which demands to save the future of higher education in Ireland. Please see our detailed briefing on the issue here. Finally, please see our statement here, an email we sent to Trinity College Dublin here, and our email to TD template here. We are continuing this campaign that we first started in January 2022, see original statement here.
We would like to ask you to support the abolition of student fees, adequate funding for higher-education and protection of our universities’ autonomy. We need to stand up and make our voices heard and warn people of the impending catastrophe that will affect third-level education in Ireland for decades to come if this bill passes.
We put this up today where the @SciGalleryDub used to stand in @tcddublin. One of the last spaces of informal learning in Dublin, it became yet another victim of capitalism as our cultural institutions in Ireland disappear one by one. Our society shouldn't be for profit. pic.twitter.com/BoE2xL6CdU
We won! Following intense advocacy efforts by us, @tcdsu and @TrinityGSU, the fee increase has been widthdrawn. This shows the power of the collective to fight the commercialization of academia. Onwards towards an equitable education system. pic.twitter.com/9iJRZrVbAV
Board of @trinitycollegedublin is discussing a 10% increase at the moment. We were not many at the protest today, but we will build until our numbers grow. Let’s unite with staff in opposition to the commercialization of academia and let’s protect our communities.
This fee increase will hurt the most vulnerable and presents a further barrier to accessing education. Students are being evicted because they can’t pay rent. Students are struggling to pay for groceries. Students are being left behind. The pandemic has only compounded this issue. Rent hikes, the student contribution fee, and international fees, all of which have gradually but greatly increased over the past decades, have made it so that students and their families (who may have also suffered unemployment because of Covid-19) struggle to pay College-related expenses. Many take up part-time jobs or student loans, but even this is not enough. In our College, during the pandemic, more than 250 students were in rent or fees arrears.
We must organize in grassroots groups, political associations, trade unions. Corporatization must be resist. We cannot and will not yield.
Students4change COMMITTEE AFTER PROTEST, BEFORE HEARING NEWS THAT 9 board members dissented and the fee increase proposal was scrapped.
No student or staff should have to wait months to get help. On the pictures, waiting times of @trinitycollegedublin‘s counselling services from our survey. We demand that College give adequate funding to wellbeing services and that more attention be paid to mental health by those in-charge. Sign a student’s petition here for increased welfare funding.
No student or staff should have to wait months to get help. On the pictures, waiting times of @tcddublin's counselling services from our survey. We demand that College give adequate funding to wellbeing services and that more attention be paid to mental health by those in-charge. pic.twitter.com/EANurcO2SR
According to a memo from the Martine Smith, Dean of Graduate Studies on the 20th of September a working group of the Graduate Studies’ Committee comprised of students, staff and management decided that the guidelines of lecture recording of 2020-2021 (that all lectures should be recorded) should remain in place for 2021-2022 “given the uncertainty about the public health environment and the extent to which reliance on remote teaching and learning might persist”. This policy should “remain in effect where possible – i.e., lectures should be recorded and made available through the VLE where possible and practicable, for the remainder of the academic year.”
Since September 2021, many students indicated the lack of access to remote learning and the changing attitudes of College, as described in the results of our inclusivity survey. Recently, the College seems to have backtracked on its promise completely.
The fact that a working group comprised of all stakeholders approved a certain set of guidelines which then seem to have been removed by the Provosts’ Office by a snap of a finger indicates deep-seated issues with governance. It is absolutely undemocratic and inconsequential to act in such a way. There was also no proper communication around the issue.
We demand an immediate re-instation of hybrid learning – recording of lectures – since the pandemic is not over for many people, such as those who are immuncompromised or cannot get the vaccine for medical reasons.
We are releasing the memo from the Graduate Studies’ Committee below. This memo was presented at the COLSAG meeting on the 21st of September 2021 .
The Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science has published a new bill detailing amendments to the Higher Education Authority Act, 1971 in January 2021[1]. The GSU and Students4Change are extremely concerned with the contents of this bill and what it entails for the future of third-level education in Ireland. The HEA Bill 2022 aims to alter the relationship between the state and third-level educational institutions. It amounts essentially to a government takeover of academia, and will result in a loss of student representation during a time when the country is in a difficult financial situation and in the midst of a mental health crisis.
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One of the more prominent tenets of the bill is more state control over third level education. One of the specific proposals would result in a reduction in the number of TCDSU representatives on Trinity College Board, both in actual numbers and proportional to the size of the board. Currently both Students’ Union and Graduate Students’ Union presidents and the SU Education Officer and SU Welfare Officer sit on the Trinity College Dublin Board. The bill would lead to a reduction to 2 student representatives down from 4, with the loss of the Education Officer and Welfare Officer of the SU on the Board. This is a change both the SU and the GSU are set to oppose[2].
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Additionally, the proposals in the bill constitute a significant overreach of the Government in the administration of third-level education. Changes will enable the government to intervene in our institutions and further push their neoliberal agenda, resulting in even-more corporatization. The bill essentially amounts to state ownership of academia.
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If the bill becomes law, colleges will have to adhere to designated “frameworks” in order to secure their funding, and the composition of their decision-making bodies will have more state-appointed members.[3]
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The punishment for Universities not following the instructions of the government is dire. Some of them involve withholding of funding, some of them involve giving instructions to the higher education institution which if they do not follow they will lose funding. It is very hard to see how any real realistic autonomy will be maintained if the bill passes. Already dependent on the state for scant funding, universities will further be tied to the government.
There is an appeals Board but it is not independent, as the minister appoints it. There is as such no sign that an appeals Board would act independently of the minister.
Furthermore, the powers of Universities to appeal certain measures which are taken against them is relatively limited as to what can be appealed. Furthermore, it seems that the fact that an appeal has been taken does not operate as a stay on what it has been instructed to do. A university may have to proceed to do what it is being told to do even when it is appealing the decision which was the basis for it being told to do it.
In addition, the HEA Bill will give extended powers to the Chief Executive Officers of the HEA as opposed to the Board of Colleges. Specifically, they and not the Board may co-decide the conditions that go along with funding and may seek information from the government in relation to compliance with those conditions. They may also order a review from the Board or appoint an external review to make sure those conditions are being followed.
At the Board meeting of Trinity College Dublin held on the 19th of January 2022 it was discussed what is to be expected from the government’s new HEA bill relating to changes in College governance. The student representation in attendance are extremely concerned of the loss of autonomy and the loss of the student voice proposed in the bill.
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The College’s Statues and Schedule Working Group will have to rewrite the the College Statutes[4], which is an affront to the autonomy of third-level educational institutions, so as to make it match with the bill’s requirements. Most Colleges will have to have a 17-member governing body, as follows.
3 of the 8 external members will be appointed by Minister Harris’ Office and the other 5 by the governing body itself.
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Our College, however, will be the only university permitted to retain a majority of internal board members due to the “distinct role played by Fellows within the Trinity community”, according to the Department of Further and Higher Education. To accommodate this, Trinity may have up to 22 members on its governing body while other universities will have a maximum of 17[6]. This is, however, not enough to stop the loss of student representation, both absolute (2 less) and proportional (2/22 is 9% which is less than 4/27 which is 15%).
The College has proposed that in order to mitigate the diluting effects of student representation, the Welfare and Education Officers would be retained as observers. The College has further said it will want to put former student union sabbatical officers as 2 external representatives of the 5 governing-body-appointed representatives.
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All of these proposals are unacceptable. It will dilute the student voice during a pandemic and its aftershock and a financially turbulent time for many of us , not to mention will dilute one of the most important student representatives, the Welfare Officer. The Welfare Officer is on-the-ground dealing with casework and needs to be represented on Board. A student can never have enough representation. Furthermore, hand-picked former student union sabbatical officers are no substitute for student representatives who are actually there and know the issues of the student body, not to mention that hand-picking by College’s senior management will lead to those getting appointed to Board who are not keen on upsetting the apple cart.
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Furthermore, government funding of our College amounts to 39% and students contribute around 42%[7] of the College’s annual budget. Even from a consumerist perspective, it is not justified that more external members will come on the Board when we have student representatives who can ensure “value for money” in financial terms. No matter which way one looks at it, this Bill must be resisted by everyone in our community.
“It is the failure of successive Irish governments to fund adequately the third-level sector (and to eschew its own accountability for this) which has led, quite logically, to the imposition of the Bill. In this regard the passivity of university presidents and their failure to challenge the move robustly is nothing short of breath-taking. The argument that we must “tow the line” as more funding will otherwise be cut is naive, lacking in courage and strategy, and a grave dereliction of duty.”
– Professor Sarah Alyn-Stacey, Trinity College Dublin.
“The proposed legislation on university governance will shrink, not only the size of governing authorities, but will also serve to muzzle the voices of academic and administrative staff. As outlined, membership will be weighted in favour of external (including ministerially appointed) members. Far from guaranteeing more robust governance, the more likely outcome will be a further constraining of critical voices.”
– Professor Eoin Devereux, University of Limerick.
The state is asserting itself and Colleges are agreeing with its par to decide on university matters, such as the composition of the Board.
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Students4Change and the GSU calls on Trinity College Dublin to immediately and publicly voice its opposition to the new HEA Bill. If the College does not call upon the government to prevent the passing of this bill, with its full strength thrown behind its opposition, then the GSU will refuse to sign the upcoming Student Partnership Agreement (SPA). The SPA is essentially a document describing College’s commitment and respect of the student voice through cooperation. We call upon the TCDSU to follow in our footsteps and refuse to sign the Student Partnership Agreement (SPA) until College comes out in complete opposition to the new bill. In addition, we will also be challenging the bill in the Oireachtas by making a submission to the relevant committee, and would welcome your contributions.
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Colleges’ governance disregards students and staff, and has for a long time, not to mention how increasingly corporatized it has become. However, the answer isn’t government intervention, it is massive student-staff pressure from below. We need to resist the encroachment of academia with our full might. There comes a time when strongly-worded letters are not enough; when circumstances call us to action, and when nothing must be off the table – strikes, marches and occupations to make our will known.
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We call upon the College, the Board, students, Visitors, Fellows and Scholars; staff and workers; trade- and student unions; societies; political groups on-campus and outside to oppose the government takeover of academia and the weakening of democracy with the utmost urgency.
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