Aisling Dolan (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome all of our guests. We had fine presentations this morning. I thank them for their time. I might just direct a few questions as I go. We have eight minutes. If there is time at the end, anyone can join in.

I thank Dr. Seoighe. I would have a great knowledge of SFI and a great understanding and appreciation of what it is seeking to be delivered. The same is true of the IRC because I have worked in the research office in NUI Galway. In the context of the Irish Precarity Network, I must admit that it was my first time but I would have been of those precarious researchers - perhaps I am precarious now as well - in terms of the fact that I worked on Horizon 2020, as a sort of research project manager, on one of those awards in the college. I am very conscious that non-Exchequer funding drives the fact that we are able to offer that type of experience for researchers, postdocs and master's degree students that otherwise would not happen if we did not have that success with our principal investigators, PIs, in all of our colleges and third level institutions.

I am also conscious of the fact that it is not a way to have these continuous contracts non-stop, whereas when one can get an award, maybe for five years, one knows that one is hopefully in position for five years as a researcher or a master’s student. Though depending on the type of research as well, they are taken on at different times. It might be that the postdoctoral supervisor-type role is taken on first and the master’s student comes in perhaps later on if they are doing statistical work or things like this. There are different methods that colleges and PIs have to manage when they are looking at their workforce. I suppose this happens in many other industries as well. In some ways, the more successful we are at bringing in non-Exchequer funding at third level, the more crucial it is in terms of driving excellence. When we have excellence in this country in terms of research professorships and so on, then we will attract excellence from across the world to come to Ireland, which is what we want to see.

It is very nice to meet Dr. Seoighe. He spoke a little bit about the importance of doctoral level education, which has been crucial in terms of the Science Foundation Ireland funding model, and how that important that is important for Ireland and the world as a societies. In this model coming forward, how would he see that we could improve the opportunities for people who come out with PhDs? In other words, sometimes we have our PhDs coming out of our universities and they are perhaps not taken up immediately by industry. How do some of our more traditional universities get over that sort of hill that sometimes other universities are better able to navigate with perhaps more practical placements and so on?

I was very interested in the presentation by Dr. Younus. I am very much aware of the difficulty when it comes to women, particularly in the context of the short-term and temporary contracts. I would have been aware of the organisation Women in Technology and Science, which was, perhaps, previous to Women in Research Ireland. How does Dr. Younus see us supporting women with this model in a better way? For example, colleges now have developed more diversity recognition and have gender quality and diversity inclusion officers. Is that working? Does she have one or two examples of how she thinks it might improve? I know NUI Galway has done a huge body of work in terms rolling out the concerned framework related to sort of harassment type issues as well, that we, unfortunately, increasingly see at third level.

I thank Dr. Smyth from the ESRI. I would come from Ballinasloe, Roscommon and east Galway, and absolutely delighted because we would have seen debt funding coming out and delivering equality of opportunity for schools, particularly at post primary level and the importance of that in supporting students to access third level education. For example, the higher education access route, HEAR, and disability access route to education, DARE, programmes are sort of new, but there would be higher education and disability access. Can Dr. Smyth speak a little bit to that and what supports are coming? When we see that more than 240,000 students are accessing some form of delivering equality of opportunity supports, be it by means of smaller class sizes, more teaching supports or more supports when it comes to identifying career opportunities, be it further education and perhaps not going down a traditional educational model. On the precarity side, I would be very welcome to have Dr. Kennedy’s thoughts on this model as well if we have time for all of that. I apologise for taking up so much time.