Teknovis

I heard about Raise Your IQ a few months ago, but I never got around to blogging about it. I must admit that I know very little about it, and I would normally be quick to dismiss such a concept. However, what caught my attention was the number of well known entities that are behind this, including NUI Maynooth and Enterprise Ireland.

I hope to give it a try coming into the winter months. I will be sure to write about my experiences here :)

Tags: Enterprise Ireland, NUIM

The Irish Government’s spending watchdog (the Comptroller and Auditor General) has reported on the staff overspending in Irish Universities, and some of the findings are reported in University staff paid €8.1m in excess of approved rates – Comptroller & Auditor General.

The breakdown is as follows:

• UCD – 3,600,000€
• UCC – 1,640,000€
• TCD – 1,500,000€
• UCG – 578,000€
• UL – 448,000
• NUI Maynooth – 272,000€
• DCU – 53,000€

However, it is not all good news regarding DCU – it bailed out two of its subsidiary companies. I do not understand why these companies were created as commercial ventures in the first place.

WIT (not a university) also receives criticism:

It cites breaches of spending policy on subsistence and hospitality – including €18,452 spent on flowers and €3,067 on gifts.

Unfortunately, I am not surprised by this :o It is not the first time that WIT has been found misappropriating funds (see How WIT Spends the Taxpayers’ Money). WIT seems to have the worst reputation in Ireland based upon the people whom I have met!

I would like to think that the institutions involved have repaid the money, and that the relevant people have been demoted or fired.

Tags: DCU, NUIM, TCD, UCC, UCD, UCG, UL, WIT

There are new university rankings published this week, and it is bad news for all of the Irish universities. See Most Irish universities fall further in world ranking for details of the Irish situation, and QS World University Rankings 2011/2012, now with fees information for the complete rankings. As an aside, I think the DCU satisfaction at improving four places is seriously over optimistic!

Additionally, as one UCD researcher whom I know said:

I wonder will Des Fitzgerald’s salary be reduced in line with UCDs falling performance.

Personally, I think it is unlikely :| (The background to this comment is in The top 100 best-paid in education.)

Maybe the solution from an Irish point-of-view is to create a good university and a bad university, in the style of the banking solution. Actually, maybe not when it is considered how well the Government have managed that!

So in summary, Irish universities are delivering poor service at exceptionally high costs. Welcome to the knowledge economy – Irish style!

Tags: DCU, DIT, NUIM, TCD, UCC, UCD, UCG, UL

Science Foundation Ireland has announced its latest round of funding, in which 15 million Euro will be distributed to fund 79 different university projects. All of the usual universities are in there. See Robust and competitive research will drive Ireland’s economic development – Sherlock for the details.

To be honest, I find it a bit depressing to see some of the names I first came across over 10 years ago in that list, and these people are still doing basically the same projects. It makes me feel that the world moves on, but academics never change :|

Tags: DCU, DIT, NUIM, Science Foundation Ireland, TCD, UCC, UCD, UCG, UL

Science Foundation Ireland is an organisation that is tasked by the Irish Government to invest 1.4€ billion in fourth level research in the areas of science, technology, and innovation. (Chris Horn noticed that it is unfortunate that Science Foundation Ireland’s remit excludes Engineering in Accident and Emergency Beds ? Or….)

I am familiar with some of the Science Foundation Ireland projects that are currently being funded in the Irish Universities, so I will briefly mention them here for my own record. I am listing these projects because I either know some of the people involved in them, or they are of interest to me. (I am certainly not suggesting that they are the best in any way!)

There are two Strategic Research Clusters (SRCs) that are of interest to me:

• ITOBO is investigating the creation of new types of buildings that make greater use of information and communication technology. For a long time I have felt that current buildings are really just large, but dumb, devices that contain many simple but totally independent systems. So I think that there is a lot of potential here to create really smart buildings simply by linking these systems and giving them some intelligence. This project is based in UCC.
• StratAG is investigating methods for measuring and processing spatial information. It is based in NUI Maynooth.

For the complete set of Strategic Research Clusters projects see Strategic Research Clusters.

There are three Centres for Science, Engineering & Technology (CSETs) that are of interest to me:

• Clarity is investigating techniques for sensing data in the real world, and then combining this data with existing digital information. This project is based in both DCU and UCD.
• CTVR is investigating both low-level and high-level issues that are relevant to the next generation of telecommunications networks. It is based in TCD.
• Lero is investigating techniques for developing dependable software. It is based in UL.

For the complete set of Centres for Science, Engineering & Technology projects see Centres for Science, Engineering & Technology.

Tags: Chris Horn, Clarity, CTVR, DCU, Ireland, ITOBO, Lero, NUIM, Science Foundation Ireland, StratAG, TCD, UCC, UCD, UL