Upgraded RTCs must keep their eye on the ball

This week an international review team, which was set up in May by the Minister for Education at the time, Niamh Bhreathnach, under the chairmanship of Professor Dervla Donnelly, is meeting for the first time. The team's mission is to process applications from RTCs for the right to grant their own awards.

The review team's terms of reference have yet to be finalised, but it is understood that it will quickly set about talking to the colleges. Applications are forwarded to the review team by the Department of Education. "I'm very positive about what we're about," says Donnelly. "I'm looking forward to it and want to get it right."

It's safe to assume that, because of its new status, Waterford Institute of Technology will be the first college to be reviewed. Cork RTC, meanwhile, is currently preparing a submission.

When Minister Bhreathnach announced the upgrading of Waterford RTC in January, she unleashed a process which had the potential to fragment the whole of the RTC sector. Shortly before Waterford's promotion, she announced that the Dublin Institute of Technology was to receive its own degree awarding status. Commentators began to ask themselves if they were seeing "a new beginning or the end of the RTC/DIT sector as we know it."

In response to complaints - especially from Cork RTC which believed that in upgrading Waterford it was being overlooked - Bhreathnach hurried to establish a group to advise on the upgrading of all the RTCs to Institutes of Technology. The report of the high-level group to advise on the technological sector recommends the retention of a binary third-level system, with a distinctive technological sector and the establishment of an Irish National Institute of Technology (INIT) which would be the main validating and awarding authority for the redesignated RTCs.

The main recommendations were accepted by the Minister, who then set up a review team to process applications from RTCs seeking devolved awarding status from INIT. The highlevel group report has been broadly welcomed by the RTCs, which see it as a means of avoiding a break-up of the sector. "We are committed to the idea of a binary system," confirms Brendan Goggin, registrar of Cork RTC. "The strength of the system is that there are two different sectors - we wouldn't want it to be further fragmented. The report and the review will provide a unifying framework."

Many observers agree that, whatever the roots of the decision to review RTCs, it is long overdue. The RTCs were established back in the 1970s and were intended to play key roles in regional development. The role, influence and size of the colleges has grown enormously since then and nowadays they are widely regarded as playing significant roles in the national economy.

Indeed many multinational companies have located in the regions precisely because of a proximity to an RTC. In the new industries there is a huge demand for technicians - that is, holders of certificates and diplomas.

In its submission to the high level group, the IDA stated that "its client companies are concerned with any marginalisation of the role and value of the RTC qualification. Certificate/diploma qualifications are in short supply. The colleges are absolutely central to technician education."

While the RTC sector is well aware of its own extensive strengths, the image of the colleges is largely overshadowed by the universities. However good their qualifications and however easy it is for holders of RTC certificates, diplomas and degrees to find well-paid jobs and climb the ladder of success, in the public mind the RTCs are often seen as being in some way inferior to the universities.

Time was when "the Irish mammy" wanted her son to be a priest - now she wants sons and daughters to be doctors, dentists or lawyers. The aspiring middle-classes - particularly in Dublin - tend to overlook the RTCs when they're filling in their CAO application forms.

The RTCs are aware, too, that their campuses lack the glamour of the universities. They suffer from boring, Seventies buildings. Huge improvements have been made to RTC campuses since 1993 when the colleges were given autonomy, but they still have along way to go.

Funding is a major issue for the colleges. The Report of the Steering Committee on the Future of Higher Education shows that in 1993 £4,140 was spent on each university student, but only £3,720 on each RTC/DIT student. The colleges say that extra money is required to bring student facilities up to university levels - and cash is needed to maintain equipment at leading-edge levels.

On the other hand, the RTCs have studentstaff ratios for which the universities would die. According to the 1993 Steering Report, the RTC/DIT ratio was 14 to 1, compared with a university figure of 22 to 1.

For the moment, the RTCs are pleased with their new designation as Institutes of Technology. But, if the recommendations of the review group are taken on board, they will have a number of titles to chose from, all including the terms Institute of Technology.

Colleges could, for example, opt to be called: (Town/City Regional/Region Institute of Technology; (Region) Regional/Region Institute of Technology or National Institute of Technology. However, "any college", the reports says, "to which delegated authority to make awards is to be accorded should be given the option of being styled/redesignated as the (Town/City) Institute of Technology (Town/ City)."

Colleges with delegated authority will have to decide whether they want the term National (which could be considered prestigious) in their titles. If they do so, presumably there will be little to distinguish their status from colleges which lack the right to grant their own awards.

Officially the RTCs say that they have no interest in becoming universities. They see certificate and diploma courses as their bread and butter. At Cork RTC for example, "we are very concerned with meeting labour and market requirements in a range of disciplines and at a range of levels," says Brendan Goggin.

However, Patrick Downey, WIT's registrar, says that in Waterford "the academic profile will change significantly. In order to address the deficit of degree provision in the South East, we need 4,000 degree places but we currently have only 2,000. When we recruit additional students the emphasis will be on that provision." In the future, he says, Waterford will offer up to 3,500 certificate/diploma places.

According to one RTC source, the push for degrees comes from students and parents rather than the colleges. "The same question comes up again and again - `I'm doing a national certificate, how do I get a degree?'." It's true though that the sector would like to see an expansion of the ladder system which allows students to progress from certificate through diploma to degree programmes, often going into industry after the diploma and returning at a later stage to take the degree.

"We must get away from the mind-set that after the Leaving Cert you do a three or four-year degree," says an RTC source. "The certificate, diploma, degree route which includes extensive work experience is valuable."