Court hears audiology students’ pleas

Court hears audiology students’ pleas


Ciara Galvin

TWO former St Mary’s Secondary School Ballina students were told last week that they would be able to complete their third-level course. Megan Munnelly and Marina Forbes, who have completed the first year of an audiology degree, were told a month earlier that the course had been cancelled.
Ms Munnelly – along with fellow student, Cork native Diarmuid O’Connor – sued the Institute, the Health Education Authority and the HSE for cancelling the BSc in Audiology, affecting 21 students who were due to start their second year at the end of the summer.
The High Court heard that the institute cancelled the audiology course at Athlone Institute of Technology (AIT) – the only on in Ireland – because the HEA had refused to fund the four-year programme, as the HSE would not guarantee clinical placements for the students.
The 21 students had been offered student places in alternative courses after they heard the news last month.
The HSE said it is now in a position to offer a number of clinical placements for the students when they enter their third year. A HSE spokesperson said the offer was being made on a once-off basis only to this particular group of students. No new students will be accepted onto the course this year, as it is being wound down.
On AIT’s website, the institute states that students will have an ‘opportunity to learn in state-of-the-art science facilities, which have benefited from some €3 million investment in recent years’.
The institute also states that the BSc in Audiology is cancelled for intake in September 2013.