Students’ perspective of Irish Higher Education Institutions’ role in meeting the economy’s recessional needs

This paper will be in two parts; the first section will examine the current tertiary education situation in Ireland amid the global economic crisis and will review what should education’s contribution be to help alleviate the crisis. Through doing this both the state and the market, who have interests in the academy and their graduates produced, will become part of the review, as building stronger links with the academy and the economy to help raise skills, efficiency and productivity is becoming more important in ensuring global competitiveness and retaining equality and accessibility in the academy (see Gaffikin and Morrissey, 2003: 98). The second and final section will look at the merge of entrepreneurship and education. As the lifelong learning society is conceptualised largely in terms of maintaining a flexible and competitive economy in the knowledge society, the concept of an entrepreneurial society will be proposed to fill the gap which has emerged since the exit of many international companies for cheaper labour elsewhere. Within all levels of education entrepreneurship should be encouraged and embedded in the curricula from the earliest stages as a prevention rather than cure to the current economic crisis in Ireland.