The National Strategy for Higher Education to 2030 [link to National Strategy for Higher Education document] provides a roadmap for the most fundamental reform of Irish higher education in the history of the State. That reform is now well underway, with the merging of institutions and the development of clusters of collaboration to enhance quality of outcomes and create scale, in order to develop a more coherent system of higher education institutions, working together, to deliver on stated national objectives.

A System Performance Framework [link to subpage on System Performance Framework], stating national priorities and key objectives of Government for higher education was set out by the Minister for Education and Skills for 2014-2016. The HEA has presented two Annual System Performance Reports against those objectives. The third Annual System Performance Report is due in 2017.

In order to deliver on the objectives set out in the System Performance Framework, the HEA engages in a process of strategic dialogue [link to subpage on Strategic Dialogue] with the higher education institutions. Specifically, this dialogue seeks to:

• Demonstrate how each institution is making its distinctive contribution to key national expectations of higher education
• Support institutions’ efforts to improve their own performance – through better strategic planning and management, particularly with regard to the increasingly competitive global environment in which our institutions operate
• Demonstrate how institutions are performing against the objectives set out in their own strategic plans
• Enhance the accountability of higher education in respect of the very significant public funding allocated annually.

To further the development of the strategic dialogue process initiated in 2013, the HEA has also introduced performance funding [link to subpage on Performance Funding] as part of the strategic dialogue process.

You can read about the System Performance Framework, how strategic dialogue works and about performance funding in this section.


Our use of cookies

We use necessary cookies to make our site work. We'd also like to set optional analytics cookies to help us improve it. We won't set these optional cookies unless you enable them. Using this tool will set a cookie on your device to remember your preferences.

For more detailed information about the cookies we use, see our Privacy Policy page

Necessary cookies

Necessary cookies enable core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility. You may disable these by changing your browser settings, but this may affect how the website functions.

Analytics cookies

We'd like to set Google Analytics cookies to help us to improve our website by collecting and reporting information on how you use it. The cookies collect information in a way that does not directly identify anyone.