COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL
MEETING OF SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL
Monday, September 12, 2011
QUESTION NO. 15
QUESTION: Councillor D. Looney
To ask the Manager to provide a report on the rollout of the 2011 Student Grants applications system?
REPLY:
As reported to the Meeting of South Dublin County Council in July 2011 the Student Support Scheme for the 2011/12 academic year was approved by the Department of Education and published on the studentfinance.ie website. The Scheme applies in relation to the provision of grants to students in the 2011/12 academic year, where such year begins on or after 1 September 2011.
As part of the overall student grants reform programme, the four existing grant schemes have been consolidated and this year, a single unified student grant scheme is being introduced to cover all study from PLC through to postgraduate levels. The development of a single scheme was enabled by the Student Support Act which was signed into law in February 2011. As a consequence of the legislation, the student grant scheme for 2011/12 is now governed by:
- The Student Support Act 2011
- The Student Support Regulations 2011- SI 304/2011
- The Student Grant Scheme 2011 – SI 305/2011
The principal changes as it relates to Local Authorities as Awarding Bodies relate to:
- Grant eligibility, including classification as a dependent or independent student.
- Period of eligibility and progression
- Budget 2011 – Reduction of 4% (implemented Jan 2011)
- Qualifying distance criterion for non-adjacent rate of grant – 24 kilometres to 45 kilometres
- Lifting of automatic entitlement to adjacant rate of grant to mature students
- Student contribution - increase from €1,500 to €2,000
As in previous years, the closing date for applications is 31st August, 2011. South Dublin County Council has however extended this date to 30th November 2011.
A Pilot Scheme for automation of HEG data entry rolled out in September 2010 for the 2010/2011 Academic Year. At that time there were 11 awarding authorities participating in the partnership involving Department of Education & Science, CDVEC, Centre for Management and Organisation Development and Revenue and the project is managed by the CDVEC. Since September 2011 (2011/2012 Academic Year) a number of additional Local Authorities including South Dublin County Council have been included in the pilot and while initially there was strong positive customer reaction to the pilot in relation to
- Greater resource efficiency on data input
- The “intelligent” online data entry reduced the form size
- Initial reports suggest significant qualitative improvements through fully completed forms – system requirement
- Production of documentation checklist based on completed fields
it can be said that South Dublin County Council is experiencing some complications as a direct consequence of Dublin City Councils non participation in the pilot, resulting in applicants directing their applications to South Dublin County Council in error. This is causing a large amount of work in redirecting applications to Dublin City Council which involves downloading the pdf files to hard copies before physical transfer can take place. There is also a financial implication in this postal exercise. Notices have been posted on the Council’s website, Twitter and Facebook alerting students to delays which will result if applications are directed to the incorrect Authority.
The following is the position in relation to applications received at 31st August 2011:
- New Applications (to 31st August) - 813
- Renewals (to 31st August) - 617
Comparison 2010/11 to 2011/2012 (up to 31st August)
| New 2010/2011 | Renewal 2010/2011 | Ineligible (other LA) |
| 481 | 766 | 64 |
| New 2011/2012 | Renewal 2011/2012 | Ineligible (other LA |
| 813 | 617 | 283 |
While it appears that there is a substantial increase in new applications over last year a large percentage of these are deemed ineligible applications within the system as they are as outlined above for Dublin City Council.
Applications for South Dublin County Council are being processed in the order in which they are received and initial assessments are ongoing. The Budget for Higher Education Grants for 2011 is €5m and payments will begin in September on receipt of fully completed Registration Forms from Students who have been assessed and approved for an award of grant.