After three decades of continuous growth, the State's oldest university, Trinity College Dublin, is to freeze the number of students it admits because it no longer has the capacity to cater for additional demand.
The Provost, Dr John Hegarty, told The Irish Times the college had decided to cap its numbers at approximately 15,000. He said the policy of the last three decades of encouraging more school-leavers to enter university was no longer relevant. "That imperative is not there now. The imperative now is to take a serious look at issues such as lifelong learning and disadvantage."
The college will admit students through the CAO next year as normal, but there will be no additional places coming on stream, as in previous years. Since the 1970s, Trinity's student population has risen from 4,000 to 15,000.
Dr Hegarty said if Trinity expanded any further, students' college experience could suffer. He said the space available was finite and already lecture halls and other facilities were under strain.
He said for the next few years the university would try to achieve greater diversity among the student body and strive for quality in teaching.
Trinity particularly wanted to have more disadvantaged, mature and overseas students taking courses, but this would have to occur within existing numbers.
He said the cap on numbers would be reviewed in a few years and it was not a "straitjacket". If there was a major national need to expand in certain areas, Trinity would be happy to respond.
He said the cap on student numbers would be included in the university's strategic plan to be issued at the end of the year.
The move is likely to mean that Trinity's courses will continue to require extremely high points. With no additional places coming on stream, the current points levels will probably remain broadly similar year-on-year.
UCD said yesterday its student population now well exceeded 21,000, but it had no plans to introduce a cap on numbers. It faces less space constraints than Trinity and will open a new veterinary college today in Belfield.
Meanwhile DIT, the largest third-level college in Ireland, said yesterday it needed to make savings of about €2.5 million in this calendar year. Consequently, it said, some part-time courses would not commence this year, but it did not give any details. It also said recruitment would be curtailed, there would be a reduction in overtime and all equipment purchases would be postponed.