Society is going to have to agree on whether admission to university solely on exam scores is fair, an international conference on higher education access heard yesterday in Belfast.
University access programmes in the Republic routinely give students extra points if they come from disadvantaged backgrounds. The same approach operates in the UK, where three As in A-levels achieved by a student in a privileged school,may be seen as less valuable than three Bs achieved by a student from a lesser school or unsupportive family.
According to Prof Steven Schwartz, vice-chancellor of Brunel University and head of a British government inquiry into university access in England: "The public is going to have to decide which approach is fairer. People tend to feel quite strongly one way or another."
On third-level fees, Prof Schwartz, who was vice-president and vice-chancellor of Murdoch University in Australia, told The Irish Times that society had a choice between paying higher taxes or charging fees for university. In Australia, the solution was to ask students to pay their fees after they had graduated and got jobs. This policy had not discouraged economically disadvantaged people from attending university, he said.
Prof Schwartz was one of several speakers yesterday at the Association of Commonwealth Universities General Conference at Queen's University, Belfast.
Another authority on education said one of the answers to terrorism was an end to massive inequality in access to higher education in countries worldwide.
Prof Alan Gilbert, vice-chancellor of the University of Melbourne, pointed to the fact that "85 per cent of the world's population remains seriously disadvantaged and often dangerously frustrated by educational deprivation".
"The events of September 11th, 2001 were, among other things, a graphic demonstration of the hideous consequences of global inequality," he said.
The keynote address was delivered by the South African Minister for Education, Mr Kader Asmal, who argued that education could attempt to reverse growing inequality in the world.
More than 250 vice-chancellors are attending the five-yearly event. Other speakers will include Senator George Mitchell and the former President, Ms Mary Robinson.