Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 28 March 2023

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Education and Skills

The Future of STEM in Irish Education: Discussion (Resumed)

Mr. Neil McDonnell:

I suppose it is around the fact that, not dissimilar to our Programme for International Student Assessment, PISA, scores in our university education outcomes, a great many of us have letters after our name very soon after graduation but lifelong learning is not coded into how we operate. I refer to the skill set of owners and managers. A great many small business owners will not have gone to college. Even those who do or those who are in management positions in business think that a BComm, an MSc or something like that is a lifelong qualification, and it is not. They are decaying faster than they ever did before. That is where the microcredentials bit comes in.