Bridges to Higher Education

The  Access and Civic Engagement Office in Dublin Institute of Technology  have recently launched Bridges to Higher Education: A resource pack for guidance counsellors, teachers, access and community education practitioners working with young people in Dublin.

 This pack was produced by the Access Service in the Dublin Institute of Technology and was supported by the Dormant Accounts Fund.

The pack was developed in response to a clear gap in pre-entry (to higher education) in our work with DEIS schools. This gap relates to the subtle factors associated with making the transition from a family/area with little experience of higher education to successfully accessing higher education.

Research shows that these factors include:

• Issues associated with sense of identity and confidence
• Coping with transition and decision making
• Gap between culture of school and the culture of home and area
• Impact of parents’ own educational experience
• Gap between knowledge and understanding of higher education in families with no experience of higher education and the format and content of information provided by schools and higher-education institutions.

The pack provides a range of material for sessions that explore these issues. Modules and workshops can be used as stand alone sessions or as a full programme.

The pack and accompanying presentations is available here on our website: www.dit.ie/ace/resources

If you have any questions please feel free to get in touch with me,

Edel Kearney,
Project Officer,
DIT Access and Civic Engagement Office,
Grangegorman Lower,
Dublin 7.
Phone: 01-4027605
Mobile: 087-2132843
E-mail: [email protected]
Web: www.dit.ie/ace