This article is from page 4 of the 2011-08-23 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
A CLARE third-level student will be used by the Union of Students in Ireland (USI) to contest a judicial review against changes made to the way in which third-level grants are calculated.
USI president Gary Redmond confirmed to The Clare People yesterday that the case of a north Clare student, Medb Hensey, will be used to challenge new Department of Education legislation which increases the distance from a university that a student can be considered “adjacent”.
Under the new rules, which come into effect this September, Medb’s grant will be significantly cut because, even though she lives outside Ballyvaughan, she is considered to live beside NUI, Galway. The case will appear in the high court on October 7.
“Medb is being used as part of this test case. We know this won’t help Medb or other students this year but it might help her, or other students in the same position, down the line.
“We did try to impress on the judge how important the timing of the case was, with students going back to college,” said Gary Redmond, President of the Union of the Student in Ireland.
“This has placed a lot of students in severe financial difficulty and I know that many students, especially from rural areas, may have difficulty going back to college.
“The rationale behind this is that public transport has improved but if you look at a situation like Medb’s, there is no way that she can get to college using public transport each day.”
Medb is planning to take up a year’s study abroad this September and, according to her mother Antoinette, they have managed to save enough money for Medb to study abroad this September.
“USI sent an engineer out to measure the distance and we are 39km from Galway by the shortest direct route,” she said.
“This won’t be of any benefit to Medb this year but we are hopeful that USI may win this case; we will have to wait and see.
“She is going to Malta anyway. We have both been working hard to ensure that we have enough to get her there. We were both determined that that would happen.”