{"id":361109,"date":"2026-03-23T16:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T16:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/361109\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T16:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T16:22:09","slug":"one-in-four-of-students-on-diversity-medicine-course-have-family-incomes-of-more-than-e150000-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/361109\/","title":{"rendered":"One in four of students on \u2018diversity\u2019 medicine course have family incomes of more than \u20ac150,000 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Almost a quarter of students on a medicine course designed to diversify the workforce have family incomes of more than \u20ac150,000, a new survey has found.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Graduate entry medicine (GEM) was designed as a \u201csecond chance\u201d route to study medicine for individuals who did not get a place immediately after the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/leaving-certificate\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/leaving-certificate\/\">Leaving Cert<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Students on a GEM course have typically already obtained an undergraduate degree in a different field, and undertake an accelerated four-year study of medicine, rather than the typical five- or six-year programme.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">A University College Dublin\u2019s Students\u2019 Union student survey report published on Monday indicates that the high cost of tuition and lack of State support create a challenging environment for students from disadvantaged or working-class backgrounds.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Fees for GEM range from \u20ac15,080 to \u20ac18,880. Students are not eligible for free fees or the Student Universal Support Ireland grant due to it being a second degree programme.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The survey was conducted online and questioned a total of 335 students from UCD, University College Cork, University of Limerick (UL) and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) \u2013 representing around 20 per cent of the current student cohort. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">According to the findings, 23.2 per cent of students surveyed had parental income of more than \u20ac150,000. A further 9.9 per cent of students\u2019 parents earned between \u20ac130,000 and \u20ac150,000, while 8.4 per cent earned between \u20ac110,000 and \u20ac129,999.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Across all income levels, the most common source of funding to cover tuition was from parents or guardians, the survey found.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Some 64 per cent of Irish students were employed while studying, compared to 38 per cent of EU students and 10 per cent of non-EU students.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-it-article-body__interstitial-link\">[\u00a0<a aria-label=\"Open related story\" class=\"c-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/ireland\/education\/2025\/03\/03\/where-i-come-from-people-dont-do-medicine-its-not-on-your-radar-how-a-new-generation-of-doctors-is-being-trained\/\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">\u2018Where I come from, people don\u2019t do medicine. It\u2019s not on your radar\u2019: how a new generation of doctors is being trainedOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cWhen employment status was compared with parental income, the graph showed that students from higher-income households were generally less likely to be employed during their studies,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The survey also asked students to identify their biggest source of stress while at university. It found students from lower-income families were more likely to rank tuition fees and cost of living among their top stressors, compared to those from higher incomes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The report states that its findings highlight \u201ca serious contradiction\u201d at the heart of GEM and called for changes to remove these barriers for prospective students.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cGEM is promoted as a route to widen access to medicine and help secure the State\u2019s future medical workforce,\u201d the report notes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cHowever, the evidence in this report suggests that the current funding model may be undermining those ambitions. A system cannot credibly claim to widen access if the ability to take up that opportunity depends so heavily on who can afford to withstand that cost.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">It makes 10 recommendations, including reforming tuition fees, the extension of supports to these students, preventing further fee increases and developing a state-backed financing route.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The programme for government has committed to introduce a tuition fee support scheme for GEM and provide more programmes focused on preparing students for careers in rural and remote medicine, ensuring people in underserved areas have access to skilled healthcare professionals.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Speaking in response to a parliamentary question in January, Minister for Higher and Further Education James Lawless said he has asked his officials to examine a \u201crange of support options\u201d for GEM students.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cWe are also working closely with the Department of Health to progress the expansion of identified critical-health workforce needs, including medicine, both through direct and graduate entry routes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cIt is important that this matter is examined collaboratively to ensure alignment of student supports and clinical supports required to address workforce planning needs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Almost a quarter of students on a medicine course designed to diversify the workforce have family incomes of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":361110,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43,13310,5762,13354,101139],"class_list":["post-361109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-royal-college-of-surgeons-in-ireland","tag-ucd","tag-university-college-cork-ucc","tag-university-of-limerick-ul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=361109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361109\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/361110"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=361109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=361109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=361109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}