The dropout or non-completion rate at Irish universities, which can include failure at exams, compares very favourably with the international pattern, according to a report from the Higher Education Authority. But this finding is cold comfort to the thousands of students and their parents who fall through the cracks of the system.
All the universities will be disappointed with some facets of the report; the Government will be dismayed by the high dropout rate in areas like computers and science.
Across the universities there were above average dropout rates for computer science (27 per cent) science (22 per cent) and engineering (20 per cent).
The Government has invested hugely to ensure the flow of graduates in these disciplines will be enough to maintain the high-tech boom. But the report shows that thousands of students are unable to keep pace.
It may be that some are being attracted directly into a buoyant jobs market. But the report hints that the bar - in terms of academic standards - is too high for many students. Students at UL and Maynooth, for example, appear to have particular difficulties with courses where maths is a core element.
The HEA does not want the universities to lower standards. The colleges have an obligation to maintain standards - despite the boom in college places in the high-tech area and the pressure to provide graduates for industry . But the fact remains that one in five students are, literally, not staying the course in some of the most highly prized areas.
Non-completion of courses has become an increasing problem in all the universities as the numbers going to college have boomed. In 1965, only about 11 per cent of 18-year-olds went to university. In recent years, this has jumped to well over 50 per cent.
Many of these students would be the first in their family to enter third level and some are clearly finding the going tough - not just academically but also socially. NUI Maynooth found three broad areas of difficulty:
students who simply selected the wrong course;
students who failed to adapt to the requirements of third level, whether because of the academic challenge presented by the subject area, inability to cope with the personal freedom or simply through indiscipline;
Students who fail to devote adequate time to study because of part-time working commitments or, in the case of mature students, because of other timeconsuming responsibilities.
Trinity points to wider problems in its response to the HEA report. "Many of the students who present or are referred for counselling are experiencing academic or psychological problems which are having an imp act on their studies and on their integration into the college community.".
These reports from the various universities should become essential reading for guidance counsellors, parents and Leaving Cert students.
In his foreword to the report, the HEA chairman, Dr Don Thornhill - a former secretary of the Department of Education - examines the impact on individual students when they fail to complete their course. The result, he says, can be very damaging, not just in financial terms, but also in terms of reduced self-esteem and self-confidence. "Where this happens and persists, both the individuals themselves and society can be diminished."
With the backing of the HEA, all the universities have put in place strategies to address the problem. More than £400,000 of additional funding has been allocated to the HEA; each of the colleges is working on integrated programmes. UCC, for example, is investigating the introduction of a scheme where each first-year student would be assigned a tutor/mentor to address problems. The three universities with dropout rates above the national average - NUI Maynooth, DCU and UL - may also be in need of some lift to their morale. They prop up the so called "league table" on noncompletion rates.
But these comparisons may underestimate the work of these universities in reaching out to the wider community and to the less well-off.
In its defence, NUI Maynooth, for example, cites one striking statistic: some 25 per cent of its student body come from lower socio-economic groups where there are often "few family or peer examples for success in third-level education".
Similarly, the table may overstate the situation in other universities like Trinity and UCD which are the traditional colleges for the Dublin middle class.