A student newspaper, the DIT Examiner, has described the report of the International Review Group set up to examine the DIT's claim for university status as "a big zero on DIT's examination paper".
The institute's management and the students' union had wholeheartedly welcomed the report's suggestion that DIT could qualify for university status in three to five years if a number of improvements were made in the quality of its structures, postgraduate courses and staff.
However, the Examiner's editorial accuses DIT's management of "PR speak for political gain" and says there "is very little the report does not single out as lacking among the Institute's structures".
The editorial concludes that the Minister for Education "need not heed all or any of the report's recommendations, even if he is in the same post in three years' time".
It continues: "The hints from the report are heavy . . . Despite the beautifully-coloured spins put on this outcome, it is exactly what the DIT did not want, and the report's recommendations are merely an elaborate way of denying the Institute its wishes."
The DIT Examiner is published by the students' union. The union's president, Ross O'Daly, still strongly backs the DIT's efforts to gain university status. He told the paper that the report "clearly recognises the DIT as a university-level institution"; the publication of the report was "a great day" for both students and alumni. "Due to the unambiguous nature of a university, the world will recognise DIT awards and hence graduate prospects are vastly improved."
