Press Release                                                                                   

Students Are Fighting For Their Future Now

Date: Tuesday October 1st                                                           Location:  IT Sligo to Stephen Street Car Park

STUDENTS from across the Border, Midlands, and Western (BMW) Region will unite today (Tuesday October 1st) to fight for their future at the #SligoDemo. The nationwide “Fight for Your Future Now” demonstrations are taking place today to protest against any potential cuts to the maintenance grant in the upcoming October Budget 2014. The march will begin in Sligo IT and finish in Stephen Street Car Park where DJ Scruffy Duffy will be playing on arrival and speeches will be delivered to masses of students.

Students from NUIG, GMIT, Letterkenny IT, St Angelas College, Athlone IT, Sligo IT and DKIT will gather at at 1.30pm and march together to Stephen Street Car Park to express their collective voice on the upcoming Budget 2014.

The Union of Students in Ireland (USI) warned the Government last week, that students are ready to demonstrate their electoral power in the upcoming Seanad referendum. With voter registration drives underway on campuses across the country, USI expect to have 10,000 students registered on the Student Elector Registration Database (SERD) by polling day on October 4th.

With the Budget fast approaching, students in the BMW region and across the country are preparing to fight the rumored 100 million euro cuts to education. Students are mobilising their voting power via SERD, more cuts will be met with targeted voting ahead of next year’s Local and European Elections.

It is imperative for the Government to listen and have the cost of college top of the agenda when making budgetary decisions. Fighting for the future of students now is crucial to the economic recovery of Ireland.

Kevin Donoghue USI VP BMW Region says:

“Students from across the BMW region have come here today to send a clear message to the Government, not just that they are angry but any attempt to cut an already drained sector will be met with resistance.

Every student here today has been registered to vote, either at one of our drives or on the bus on the way here. Parliamentary TDs should take note that any cuts to essential educational services will be remembered at voting time.

A highly educated work force is beneficial to society as a whole. Graduates make higher contributions to revenue and are more likely to become employers. That is before we talk about the thousands of jobs third level education supports throughout the country, directly and indirectly. It comes before any of the multi million euro investments by multi-national companies and the examination of the millions of Euros that are generated every single week for local economies due to thousands of students living and spending in towns with third level institutions.

With two hundred people leaving this country for work every day and over 30% of under 25s unemployed it is hard to believe that Fine Gael and Labour are “all about jobs”. It is time for the government to put the money where its mouth is and make a significant contribution to the Youth Guarantee as well as protecting the Education Sector.”

Speakers will include: Kevin Donoghue USI VP BMW Region, Students’ Union Presidents and Member Unions BMW Region.

For more information contact USI Communications & Research Executive Grainne O’Reilly on 087-6776636, or 01-9052100