Professor ?ine Hyland:

I thank the Cathaoirleach and members of the committee for inviting me to take part in this round-table discussion on the future of STEM in Irish education. I also thank the committee for the report of May 2022 on senior cycle reform, Learning for Life, which provided an excellent overview of the issues and concerns raised by teachers. That report has been widely welcomed.

I support the statement made by Humphrey Jones on behalf of the Irish Science Teachers Association at the session of the committee on 21 March, where he set out the concerns of science teachers about the new junior cycle science and leaving certificate agricultural science syllabi. He expressed the hope that the NCCA will listen to the voice of science teachers before it finalises the proposed new leaving certificate physics, chemistry and biology syllabi.

I am particularly pleased to have the opportunity today to draw the attention of the committee to a relevant and exciting new initiative, namely, the national children’s science centre, also called the museum of possibilities. I am the chair of the exhibits advisory committee. This project has been in gestation for more than 20 years and is finally about to come to fruition. This new science centre will support and complement the Department of Education’s primary and post-primary science curriculum and will provide facilities for students and teachers at all levels, from early childhood to leaving certificate level, to engage in an interactive and non-formal way with the world of science and its possibilities.

Until now, Ireland has been the only country in the OECD and EU not to have a national children’s science centre. The need for such a science centre was identified in 2002 by the then Irish Council for Science, Technology and Innovation and was reiterated in the report of the review group on STEM education in the Irish school system in 2016.

The national children's science centre aligns with the Government’s STEM Education Policy Statement 2017-2026, which emphasises the need to nurture “curiosity, inquiry, problem-solving, ethical behaviour, confidence, and persistence, along with the excitement of collaborative innovation”. It will also contribute to the implementation of the UN’s sustainable development goals, SDGs, and it will be a resource for students and teachers in the interpretation and expansion of the Department of Education’s STEM curriculum at preschool, primary and post-primary levels.

The OPW has drawn up a stunning plan to restore and refurbish the north wing of the National Concert Hall on Earlsfort Terrace, and planning permission has recently been granted by Dublin City Council for the national children's science centre in this location. The centre, totalling almost 10,000 sq m, will house three floors of immersive, interactive exhibits, a laboratory and a purpose-built, state-of-the-art planetarium. It will have dedicated activity spaces for very young children and it will cater for primary and second-level pupils, as well as for the curious of all ages. It will have a policy of equality of access and it will have a particular focus on ensuring ready access for people of different abilities and disabilities and for those from less advantaged backgrounds.

The board of the national children's science centre, which is a voluntary group of people committed to education in STEM and the arts, is chaired by Michael Collins and includes the eminent scientists, Professor Luke O'Neill of Trinity College Dublin and Professor Brian Ó Gallachóir of University College Cork, as well as Ali Hewson, Jonathan Westrup, Mindy O'Brien, Cathy Moore and Frank Doonan. The centre will adjoin the Iveagh Gardens and will re-establish the original connection between the building and the gardens, restoring it to the way it was 160 years ago when the building was used for the International Exhibition of Arts and Manufactures. The building will not, however, encroach on the gardens themselves in any way.

In the early 2000s, the Government agreed to co-operate with the board of the national children's science centre in delivering such a centre by providing a venue and a suitable home for the centre. The original location was to have been in Heuston Gate, but that plan fell through during the recession. The current location in Earlsfort Terrace is in a wing of the National Concert Hall that has been unoccupied since the medical faculty of UCD moved to Belfield in 2007. An agreement was reached in 2016 that the OPW would conserve and renovate the building and that the board of the national children's science centre would fund the exhibits and set up a structure to manage and run the centre. We are very excited about this development, which we know will greatly increase the level of interest in STEM and STEAM education for all.

We would very much welcome the support and endorsement of the joint Oireachtas committee for the proposed new centre on Earlsfort Terrace.