Sir, – This week like other similar weeks over the last few years, students in Galway are “celebrating” an unofficial rag week.
Unofficial, because the students’ unions in GMIT and NUIG have washed their hands of it since there were major drink-fuelled incidents connected with it a number of years ago.
Taking part in rag-week activities has been a rite of passage for most third-level students for years. Unfortunately the original thinking behind them as a fundraising exercise for local charities had been side-lined long before the students’ unions withdrew their support.
It is now a week which many students take off and engage in day-long drinking fests. Donegal Tuesday, where bus-loads of students who aren’t even studying in Galway, are brought into the city is the epitome of this.
The students who organise this week are being given a free reign while the real representatives of the students, the elected members in the students unions sit back and say “nothing to do with us”.
The students’ unions need to reclaim this week and try to bring back some semblance of what rag week used to be about. – Yours, etc, TOMMY RODDY Salthill, Galway.