Student’s results deferred
A class of 42 students at DkIT who have just completed third year of the college’s Social Care course say there ‘stunned’ to find their results for the year had been ‘deferred’.
It is understood the issue centres around placement hours, which are a course requirement set down by the social care sector’s oversight body, CORU.
Because of Covid-19, the students were unable to complete their entire placement hours in April and May and the college offered alternative assessment methods.
Dundalk TD Ruairi O’Murchu said: ‘ The students said they believed they would be graded and moved into their fourth and final Level 8 degree year in September, but they were ‘stunned’ to see their grade had been deferred.’
A spokesman for DKIT said: DkIT like all Higher Institutes of Institutes (HEI) across Ireland, made firm commitments during the COVID-19 pandemic to preserve the academic integrity of all degree programmes and to ensure that students would not face any academic disadvantage as result of unprecedented yet unavoidable changes to academic programmes as result of nationwide restrictions.’
But he said that in relation to the BA (Hons) in Social Care at DkIT, academic teams have applied for recognition by CORU, the regulatory body for Health & Social Care Professionals in Ireland. ‘ The programme team has continually updated the programme with the aim of meeting the criteria and standards of proficiency that are required by the profession. In line with this, students on this programme are required to complete a minimum of 800 supervised hours of work-placement.’
‘Due to the COVID-19 health emergency, all work placements scheduled to take place in Semester Two had to be halted in March in line with national guidelines to ensure the health and safety of all students. A situation that was common among all Institutes of Technology nationwide.’
In response to the crisis, social care education providers across Ireland engaged in extensive consultation with their regulator to understand the implications for assessment in light of COVID-10 and it was determined that all existing criteria and standards of proficiency would not be amended and as such there would be no derogation in the 800 hours of work placement requirement.
‘DkIT investigated a variety of ways that it could support students to achieve the placement hours requirement before the end of semester 2, such as recognition of paid employment and volunteering hours.’
But he added, this proved not to be possible, and they are now planning to reschedule work placements for Spring of 2021.
He encouraged any students with difficulty to make contact with DkIT to discuss their individual situation.