Sir, – I hope that our politicians will take time off from their present discussions and read the lecture given by President Michael D Higgins in Galway ("Universities facing 'intellectual crisis', says President", April 7th).
The nurturing of a high-quality university sector is vital to the wellbeing of any country that hopes to develop in a holistic manner. Governments and other grant-giving bodies, pushed by commercial interests, require research applications to list the expected research outcomes. This approach is entirely appropriate to a commercial research laboratory but not to the university research environment, where discovery and recognition of the unexpected are of the essence.
It clearly suits the short-term requirements of the bottom line that public-sponsored research should aim to satisfy the wants of commerce, but taking the long-term view of the common good, public resources should be used to best develop the intellectual capacity of the population. – Yours, etc,
PATRICK DAVEY ,
Shankill, Dublin 18.
Sir, – For how much longer must we be subjected to the sort of vacuous convolutions being served-up by our esteemed President?
His sociology-infused subjectivities, a reworking of Newman's Idea of a University for a secular age, must have wowed the audience at NUI Galway. He is a man on a mission – to use his fortuitously acquired platform as President of Ireland to advance his leftward-leaning world view.
Would he please be more specific? Which market-oriented training faculties would he be for curtailing? Dentistry? Law? Medicine? Engineering? IT? Or is he advocating the proliferation of still more sociology and media studies departments?
The truth is that many of our young people are being hoaxed into pursuing expensive third-level courses that lead nowhere. They would be better advised to ignore vapid mental doodlings, get a job and, if they feel like it, take an online degree. – Yours, etc,
PADDY McEVOY,
Holywood,
Co Down.
Sir, – Brian MacCraith's "Why we need more T-shaped graduates" (Education, March 29th) highlighted the need for well-rounded students and suggested that the skills expected to be of most importance in 2020 were complex problem-solving, critical thinking, creativity, people management, teamwork and emotional intelligence.
On April 7th, you reported that President Higgins has suggested that universities are under increasing pressure to produce graduates solely for the labour market and face an “intellectual crisis” over their role in society.
So what are universities to do and what do parents who sacrifice to send their children to third-level college want from their education? Parents want their children, on graduation, to be squared away with a good job and capable of looking after themselves. So college is supposed to prepare the students for the workplace.
In 2013, Mark Edmundson, of the University of Virginia, published a book entitled Why Teach? In Defence of a Real Education.
In it he describes how colleges in the United States have become totally driven by consumer demands and where the students are seen as customers, where courses are driven by the need to succeed in a material world, and where students are not given the opportunity to undertake any humanities-based studies.
In other words, they are losing out on the opportunity to develop as citizens of the future where they will question, listen and respond to various issues in their own lives and in the lives of the people around them locally and globally. He suggests that instead of asking a student what do they want to be, maybe we should ask what are their ideals.
In order to get our T-shaped graduates and well-rounded citizens of the future, might I humbly suggest that Irish third-level colleges ensure that all students get an opportunity to undertake some study of the humanities, no matter what course they are following, be it engineering, medicine, law, accountancy, etc. – Yours, etc,
Dr DAVID O’GRADY,
Killarney,
Co Kerry.