Access education is something which has flourished over the past ten years. Access education offers young people the opportunity to gain a third-level education who otherwise might not get this chance.

Access education works through link schools from lower socio-economic backgrounds attempting to rectify the situation whereby certain sectors of society are under-represented at third level. Access offices work throughout all of the major universities in Ireland; they are becoming stronger each year. However, they have raised many questions.

Is education a right or a privilege? Once upon a time, education was most certainly a privilege. For many years education was a luxury reserved for the wealthy and elite of our society.

The notion that education at third level would be open to young and older people from all walks of life was almost laughable. There is no doubt that this is no longer the case. Education is widely available for the people who are prepared to go out and fight for the future that they want.

But what happens when the struggle becomes too much and the fight just doesn’t seem worth it. What happens to the student who fights for the future they wanted, but who fails to fit into the mould that was created long before they were even thought of?

In recent years education has been cracked wide open by access programmes. Speaking as a University student who came directly from an access programme, I can speak directly from experience. Experience that was not always pleasant.

I believe that access students need to work twice as hard to gain a place in university– in some cases it means an extra year of studying before they actually begin their degree.
As it stands, college life is challenging to begin with, it is the start of a whole new world. There shouldn’t be a problem with education being widely available to people who are prepared to work for it. There shouldn’t be a problem, but there is.

As open as education is becoming, some people refuse to move with the times. There are certain people in this society that believe if you can’t pay for it you shouldn’t have it.

How many points you received in the Leaving Certificate can be a contentious issue because not all access programmes work on a points scheme. If you didn’t get the points and are an access student, then in some people’s minds clearly you don’t belong in their world.

When students are made to feel out of place in their University life they stop going to class, begin to fall behind and before they know it, it’s exam time and they’re not ready.

The solution lies in education, it lies in people learning that there are different people in this life. These people need to remember that different does not mean bad, it just means different. I’m sure that all college students can learn a lot from each other, not all education comes from a classroom or lecture theatre.

Education comes from experience and experience comes from life. There are many different walks of life. The secret to a successful education is an open mind.