The Union of Students in Ireland has condemned claims that the Government plans to abolish all financial support for new postgraduate students.
A report in the Sunday Business Post claims that from next year existing grants and maintenance support for postgraduates will be scrapped.
The Department of Education has not commented on the report.
If the proposal went ahead, the move would save the Government around €50 million a year.
The USI has called on students, parents and community members to gather in Parnell Square next Wednesday to demand that the Government commit to protecting education.
The union also called on Education Minister Ruairi Quinn to honour a pre-election pledge that there would be no increase in fees or cuts to the maintenance grant.
USI president Gary Redmond said the Programme for Government had promised a ''surgeon’s scalpel would be taken to waste and inefficiency in the Higher Education.
"Instead a butcher’s cleaver appears to have been taken to student supports such as the Maintenance Grant.''
He claimed that the number of students able to progress to Masters and PhD level would plummet and Higher Education in Ireland would return to being the preserve of the wealthy elite.
