Sé mo phribhléid bheith i bhur measc inniu mar cathaoirleach ainmnithe an tÚdarás um Ard Oideachas. It is a privilege and an honour for me to come before the joint committee as chairperson designate of the Higher Education Authority. I record my thanks and appreciation to the joint committee for rearranging the original date of this meeting and facilitating me. In opening, I will take a few minutes to give the committee some background on myself. I woke up in the middle of the night last night thinking about this and I realised that I had not mentioned my family in the text of my opening statement. My wife Carmel and children, Emma and Dave, are the rock of anything I have done and anything I will do in future, notwithstanding which I realised at about 4 a.m. I had not mentioned them.
I was born in Cork and went to the North Monastery Christian Brothers school. When I left school, I went straight to work at Cork Corporation as a clerical officer. After being a clerical officer, I was what was called at the time a "work study assistant" which was a role dealing with time and motion and method studies. It was an unusual thing to do at the time. From there, I joined AnCo, the industrial training authority and precursor to FÁS, as a training advisor and, subsequently, I moved to the Institute of Public Administration as training specialist. I was there for approximately two and a half years before moving from the IPA to the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, RCSI, where I was an administrative assistant. I remained in the RCSI until I stepped down as chief executive in December 2009.
During my time in the RCSI, I was involved in all aspects of college management, including student affairs, curriculum development, faculty administration, examinations, human resources, and project management. Finally, I worked there as chief executive.
I was deputy chief executive for nine years before I became chief executive. In the 1990s, I was also deputy director of a contract we had to manage in a hospital in north-western Saudi Arabia. Later in the 1990s, from 1993-94, I was involved in the establishment of the first overseas campus of RCSI in Penang, Malaysia - the Penang Medical College. In early 2000, I initiated and led the project of developing the first online surgical training programme, at the time the first in the world. It is named BeST, which stands for Basic electronic Surgical Training. This training programme comprised over 400 hours of online instruction in all aspects of the basic sciences of surgery. It is still in use and continues to be an exemplar of what is possible in terms of e-learning. In 2002, I led the negotiations and the team establishing our campus in Bahrain. This campus has a purpose-built medical school building next to a general hospital. The building was officially opened by President Mary McAleese in 2006.
Not long after joining RCSI, I applied to and entered Trinity College as a mature student on its evening course leading to a BSc in computer science. Having completed that degree, I took a break of two to three years and then enrolled in University College Dublin to complete a masters degree in industrial engineering, which was also an evening programme. Because of that background, it is fair to say that I have a different or non-traditional view of education and, obviously, would be an advocate for flexible learning, lifelong learning or any kind of programme that makes it easier for citizens or residents of Ireland to access education in any form.
I am a chartered director, having completed the Institute of Directors programme and I currently hold directorships in a number of organisations. I chair the Health and Safety Authority, where my term ends in December of this year, having served two terms. I was honoured to be nominated for the first term by the former Minister of State, Deputy Dara Calleary, and for the second term by the Minister, Deputy Richard Bruton. I should declare that I am not a member of any political party and never have been, although I am not sure whether that is a good or bad thing. I also chair the board of TransferMate, which is a global payments FinTech company based in Kilkenny and part of the Taxback Group. I am on the board of Intuition Limited, a knowledge management learning company based in the IFSC, where I first came across e-learning in the true sense. I am a board member of Respect, the fund-raising arm of the Daughters of Charity services for people with intellectual disabilities and I have been chairing its research board for the past five years. Through the stellar work of Professor Brian Harvey, our director of research, we were awarded a Marie Curie co-fund research grant with a total value of over €7 million that will fund a total of 25 research fellows.
I applied for the position of chairperson of the Higher Education Authority, HEA, through the Public Appointments Service in January of this year and was recommended to the Minister following a competition run by that agency. My background in education and a strong sense of duty to make a positive difference was probably my main motivation to apply.
The HEA was established under the Higher Education Authority Act 1971, with amendments in the Universities Act 1997 and the Institutes of Technology Act 2006. It is the statutory funding authority for the universities, institutes of technology and a number of other designated institutions, and is the advisory body to the Minister for Education and Skills in regard to the higher education sector. The HEA also has responsibility for the effective governance and regulation of higher education institutions and the higher education system. As such, the HEA is the lead organisation for the development of a higher education and research system that meets the needs of Irish society and the Irish economy and is accountable to the Minister for Education and Skills for that leadership. A key aim of the HEA is to create a higher education system that maximises opportunities and ensures a high quality experience for students.
The Irish Research Council operates as a sub-board of the HEA and is responsible primarily for funding early-stage career researchers across all disciplines, including frontier research - it uses the tag "From arts to zoology". The vision of the council is for a healthy research ecosystem in Ireland which provides a diversity of supports and opportunities, and which enables the country to reap the full value and benefits of research.
Last year, the HEA was responsible for the allocation of €1.1 billion in Exchequer funding to the higher education institutions and is responsible for evaluating the impact of that funding through reporting on system performance. The national strategy for higher education to 2030 is a key challenge as it assigns certain operational responsibilities to the HEA. These include reform of the relationship between Government funding and institutions through performance agreements, significant structural reform on a thematic basis and the process of technological university development. The Minister has also set priorities in regard to the following: widening participation in higher education by the most disadvantaged socioeconomic groups by 7%; a 5% increase in participation by under-represented groups in initial teacher education; a 5% increase in participation by lone parents; and a 25% increase in the number of entrants studying on a flexible basis. Other priorities include doubling the number of apprenticeships by 2020, increasing work placement or work-based projects as part of the course and significantly improving retention rates. These are all exciting objectives and, with the collaboration and support of the leadership of universities and institutes, they should be more than achievable. I have no doubt that, if this is implemented, our society will benefit greatly.
Research is a vital part of the work of third level institutions. It is often said that the research of today becomes the practice of tomorrow, and that is true whether it is in medicine, technology, engineering or any aspect of academic study. Research poses many challenges, especially funding. Not everyone sees the advantages of research or recognises the outcomes of research in everyday life. It is a long-term play and requires long-term commitment. This is something not always obvious to the public but one of the truly strategic decisions any group of legislators can make is to provide sustained funding for third level research.
Most commentators agree that the current funding arrangement for higher education is unsustainable and that reform is needed to redress the cut in resources over the past eight years. The projected increase in student demand in the order of 25% over the next ten years due to demographic trends will also put additional strains on the system. The Cassells report has identified both the funding quantum and possible funding sources, of which the committee will be aware. Once political decisions are made on these major issues, it will be the responsibility of the HEA to implement them. I am very grateful to committee members for their time and attention and I would be delighted to answer any questions they may have.
