Trinity News Vol. 63, Issue 5 by Trinity News

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Volume 63, Issue 5

Features this issue

Ciarán Sunderland looks back on Ireland’s divorce referendums in 1986 and 1995, from proposal to passing.

trinitynews.ie

tn2 this issue

Dublin’s club scene; class politics on TV; culinary trends of 2017; Humans of Dublin; open relationships & more

TRINITY NEWS Trinity’s Newspaper of Record EST. 1953

Comment Is Repeal enough? p.15 Aislinn Shanahan Daly contextualises the movement

Trinity Life p.11 On the decks with DUDJ: an interview with Rob Fitzpatrick Candidates for TCDSU Leadership Race 2017 announced outside House 6

InDepth

Workers voice opposition to hiring and promotion policies alongside longstanding grievances

p.21 Peter O’Donovan looks at third level drop out rates

College trade unions raise prospect of industrial action Cathal Kavanagh Investigations Editor

Oisin Vince Coulter Editor

MEETING HELD ON 11 January 2017 saw an agreement between members of the Services Industrial Professional and Technical Union (SIPTU) and Unite trade unions to campaign in opposition to College’s hiring and promotion policies, with a ballot on industrial action by Trinity’s service and support staff being among the options considered.

steward Cieran Perry said the meeting saw a high turnout, and ended in agreement to oppose what Perry referred to as a “management diktat” around human resources (HR) policy. Section committee organiser of SIPTU in Trinity, Jack McGinley, said that the meeting had to be moved to a 198-seat lecture theatre, which was filled to capacity due to strong interest.

Union members are opposed to the cessation of promotions among nonacademic staff, and the phasing out of permanent jobs in favour of mediumterm contracts between three and seven years.

At the meeting, which SIPTU and Unite held together, staff were angry with the “lack of respect shown to staff and our representatives” over recent years, according to Perry. In a phone interview Perry said that the freeze on promotions, along with the changes in the nature of contracts, has been going on for some time but was only officially communicated to union representatives in a meeting with HR before Christmas.

The workers represented by Unite and SIPTU include cleaners, security guards, maintenance, tourism, and library staff. In an email to Trinity News, Unite shop

A report to College Board in October last year showed that the proportion of staff in Trinity on temporary contracts stood at 38%, up from 32% in 2006/7.

In a statement on behalf of College, a spokesperson said that “there continues to be promotional opportunity for staff through normal recruitment competition”, and that 44 administrative, library and support staff were promoted in this way in the 2015/16 academic year. McGinley also referred to plans to institute a management-led employee evaluation scheme, referred to in the Lansdowne Road Agreement, which a vote at the meeting on 11 January unanimously opposed. “Some people will probably get promoted, but an awful lot of other people will leave themselves open to be queried… it could be a very slippery slope.” A College spokesperson said that the development of a “revised approach for administrative, library and support staff” was indeed approved by College Board in December 2015. According to McGinley, in the wake of the Lansdowne Road Agreement being signed in mid-2015, College unions sought meetings with the HR department on the replacement of staff who

were due to retire, but that the process was dragged out: “we had to wait until December to have the initial meeting, and when the initial meeting went nowhere, we got no assurances.” The matter went to the then-Labour Relations Commission but when there was little progress, unions decided to postpone the issue until the current academic year, instead of threatening industrial action or going to the Labour Court. McGinley said that many workers in Trinity are unhappy with the degradation of employment conditions in recent years, and that there appeared to be a desire for industrial action. “An awful lot of the people here who came in the last 10 years - they’re on lesser pay, they’re on lesser conditions, they have worse holidays, they have a worse pension scheme, they have worse sick leave conditions, and in many cases they don’t have full hours,” he said. Perry referred to a staff survey carried out by Unite before Christmas, which

showed both morale and trust in Trinity’s management to be at extraordinarily low levels among support and service staff.

SciTech We look p.22 at new developments to gene editing technique CRISPR

McGinley said that union members are aware of the impact any potential industrial action could have on students, saying it would be necessary to see “who are you going to discommode, are you going to hurt the people who need to be hurt, or is there going to be collateral damage; all that has to be weighed up”. Meetings between different groups of union members are expected in the coming weeks, before another general meeting on February 14: “In the next two weeks, we’ll begin putting some kind of plan of action together,” said Perry.

Sport Dáire O’Driscoll p.24 interviews DU Boxing Club captains Aisling Anderson and Pierce Cleary

McGinley argued: “the reality will be whether people have the stomach to take either strike action or industrial action, or else people will decide they don’t want to take any action – they’re realistically the three propositions that will be in the melting pot.”

Collective bargaining introduced DUCAC runs €40,000 between teaching assistants and deficit in 2015/16 The organisation funded the deficit by drawing on their €80,000 surplus from 2014/15 department of sociology The agreement also sets a limit for weekly teaching duties, with excess hours to be remunerated.

Johnny Byrne

Deputy Investigations Editor

RINITY NEWS HAS LEARNED that PhD students in Trinity College’s department of sociology put in place a system of collective bargaining to deal with their teaching requirements. The agreement was implemented for the first time this academic year. David Cichon, last year’s PhD representative in the department of sociology, negotiated with the department on behalf of the PhD students. Speaking to Trinity News, he expressed satisfaction with the agreement reached and was pleased that he and other PhD students enjoyed a positive working relationship with the department.

He noted that the agreement sets a definite limit for weekly teaching duties, and requires that work beyond this amount be remunerated. Most importantly, he said, a process has been put in place which allows teaching assistants to openly negotiate their work requirements on a yearly basis. When asked for comment, head of the department of sociology Professor Richard Layte, emphasised the critical role that PhD students play in developing new research that contributes to the college’s reputation. He said that the school of social sciences and philosophy had been particularly hard-hit by dramatic cuts to government funding that have increased staff/student ratios. In this context, he said the department has “worked with PhD students to agree term and conditions acceptable to

all within the resources that are available”.

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...teaching assistants complained that there was no process in place for them to negotiate their work requirements

Most PhD students are required to teach in order to receive university funding and the college calendar sets a maximum weekly workload of six hours of teaching and related activities. However Trinity News reported last year that many teaching assistants across college are regularly expected to work in excess of this amount. In that piece, many teaching assistants complained that there was no process in place for them to negotiate work requirements with their school or department. Some PhD students felt unable to raise the issue of burdensome teaching duties for fear that doing so would damage their relations with more senior academics, on whom they depend for doctoral supervision, academic references and promotion.

U B L I N UNIVERSITY C E N T R A L ATHLETICS Club (DUCAC), the body that regulates and funds sports clubs in Trinity, ran a €40,000 deficit in the year 2015/16, according to accounts shared with Trinity News. DUCAC largely funded this deficit by drawing on the €80,000 surplus the body ran in 2014/15. In this way, the capitated body managed to keep expenditure roughly constant with the previous year, at around €540,000. DUCAC receives most of its revenue from the College Capitation Committee but supplements this income with a proportion of the profits from the Pavilion Bar, as well as income from other sources. Although DUCAC’s

overall spend remained much the same in 2015/16 as a year earlier, a higher fraction went towards the running of DUCAC and less went to club expenditure. One factor responsible for this is DUCAC spending €145,000 on salaries in 2016, €20,000 more than in 2015. Club expenditure fell overall, as higher spending on coaching (totaling €100,000 in 2016) was outweighed by lower spending on equipment and affiliation fees. Excluding the Pavilion Bar’s contribution directly to sports facilities development, overall income for DUCAC fell slightly year on year due to lower miscellaneous income and lower affiliate college capitation. Capitation income however increased by just over 2% to €343,294 in 2015/16. Income generated from club subscriptions remained stable at just over €13,000. The Pav contributed €90,000 to DUCAC’s operating expenses in 2015/16, down €10,000 from

the year before. The Pavilion Bar increased sales in 2015/16 by €9,000 to €877,002. Drinks sales fell by over €20,000 to €726,255, but the Pav made up for this drop by increasing food sales by €30,000. The bar spent considerably more on wages, insurance, advertising and staff training in 2015/16 and also spent almost €45,000 on refurbishment. In 2015/16, DUCAC made a €45,000 contribution towards ‘state of the art outdoor sports facilities’ the body is developing in conjunction with Trinity’s Department of Sport and Recreation. DUCAC committed to providing a total of €250,000 for this purpose on a phased basis. As of June 2016, it had contributed €170,000, of which €145,000 came from the Pavilion Bar’s profits. The accounts were audited by Leonard Accountancy, of Lower Dundrum Road, Dublin 14.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

News

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What They Said

“The short answer is no.”

News in brief

Former South African president FW de Klerk on whether the current president Zuma is carrying on his legacy at an event held by LawSoc, January 18

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“She’s just learning for learning’s sake so that she can articulate this incandescent rage between all the young women of Ireland in 2016.”

Emmet Kirwan narrating the short film “Heartbreak”

Conference causes row between UCC and Israeli Embassy The conference, entitled International Law and the State of Israel: Legitimacy, Responsibility and Exceptionalism, is due to be held in April. Jake Trant Senior Reporter

ROW HAS ERUPTED between the Embassy of Israel in Dublin and University College Cork (UCC) over plans to host a conference from March 31 to April 2 in UCC on the legitimacy of the state of Israel. The conference, entitled International Law and the State of Israel: Legitimacy, Responsibility and Exceptionalism, was originally to be held in the University of Southampton last April but was cancelled with the university citing “safety grounds”. The move came despite legal action by the organisers for it to go ahead, in the face of opposition from a number of groups who described it as an “anti-Israeli hate fest”. The embassy has stated how it is “deeply concerned” over the plans for the event

and expressed its fear that the event could promote an “unbalanced agenda within academic institutions, that seeks to demonise and delegitimise Israel”. They added that the prejudice of activists only served to “propagate hatred of the state of Israel and its people… it is incompatible with the values of democracy and goes against the essence of academic discussion”. The event was moved to UCC after Irish academics criticised the lack of freedom of speech in the UK, with the organisers stating that Ireland is a safer location due to its “different political culture”. The organiser, Oren Ben-Dor, who was born in Israel and raised in Gaza, had previously approached several other British and European universities after the cancellation of the event in Southampton but was met with further refusals. Ben-Dor, a philosophy and engineering lecturer in Southampton, stated that he

believed other universities were “afraid of the claws of the Israeli lobby”. Professor James Bowen, one of the organisers of the conference in UCC, rejected the embassy’s criticism stating that as they were “fearful of any debate on the issue, the Israeli lobby tries to prevent pro-Israel speakers from participating in such events”. He also spoke about the importance of defending academic freedom, especially where governments have a “vested interest in preventing examination of uncomfortable issues”. However UCC issued a statement saying it has not yet given permission for the event to be held, remarking: “The university management has issued no approval for the event, has sought information on the details of the proposed conference from the organisers and will determine its position following appropriate consideration.”

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“Who are you going to discommode, are you going to hurt the people who need to be hurt, or is there going to be collateral damage; all that has to be weighed up.” Jack McGinley, Section Committee Organiser of SIPTU in College, speaking to Trinity News about a potential strike by workers, January 17

“Marine repairmen” study from Trinity professor shows limpets as construction workers of the seashore David Taylor, a biomechanics engineer, has published findings on how the marine snails use construction techniques to survive. Sarah Meehan Senior Reporter

AVID TAYLOR, FROM TRINITY’S Centre for Bioengineering at Trinity College Dublin, has discovered that marine snails are found plastered on rocks at low tide. His new research has recently been published in the Journal of Experimental Biology. Limpets often suffer a lot of damage at the top of their conical shells. Rather than drying out or getting picked off by hungry seagulls, the creatures quickly patch over small holes with new biological building material from within, the research has found. These shells are just as strong as the originals when subjected to impacts from rocks.

However, while the shells do resist single impacts from materials such as rocks and stones, the shells are less resistant to multiple impacts. Electron microscopy has shown that the layered structure of the shell makes it susceptible to “spalling”, a well-known cause of failure in engineering materials such as concrete that involves the material splitting into smaller pieces. Speaking of his findings, Professor Taylor said: “you will see rocks covered with limpets along many seashores across the world. They have several features that make them interesting from a biomechanical point of view - they have evolved mechanisms for adhering very strongly to the underlying rock and are also equipped with a set of very hard teeth.”

“But they also have this very hard, stiff shell and it is this feature I was interested in knowing more about. It is incredible that they can repair their shells to be just as strong as the original ones, but it is also really interesting that they are still at risk from spalling weaknesses.” Taylor continued: “As engineers we often gain inspiration for solutions to real-world problems from nature, and from the way different plants and animals have adapted to life in harsh environments. Spalling is evidently one problem that doesn’t have a perfect solution - whether you are a concrete foreman overseeing a building site or a limpet trying to speedily repair his or her home on the seashore.”

Trinity startup “Silvercloud” TCDSU continues to push for raises €8m euro in funding greater availability of gender The online wellness company was set up in 2012 but began as a research project in Trinity. neutral bathrooms SU President Kieran McNulty launches petition to extend access to gender neutral bathrooms to TBSI Stacey Wrenn Deputy Features Editor

RINITY COLLEGE D U B L I N S T U D E N T S ’ Union (TCDSU) President Kieran McNulty has launched a petition for the College Board to create gender-neutral bathrooms in the Trinity Biomedical Sciences Institute (TBSI) on Pearse Street following the implementation of three gender neutral bathrooms in the Arts Building during

the Michaelmas term. This process began with former Welfare Officer Conor Clancy, and came to surface with current officer Aoibhinn Ní Lochlainn in September. In the last TCDSU Council in December, a motion was brought by LGBT Rights Officer Sean O’Carroll to mandate that gender neutral bathrooms are available at all TCDSU events where feasible. The motion was passed and now TCDSU are mandated to work with College to have gender neutral bathrooms available

in every college building. These actions follow other third-level institutions in providing gender neutral facilities, with the National University of Ireland, Galway, and University of Limerick being among the first to introduce them. The letter of the petition insists on the importance of this for the college, stating: “the SU in Trinity stands for equality and supporting all our students. This is a case of respecting all our students’ needs.”

Johnny Byrne Deputy Investigations Editor

HE ONLINE W E L L N E S S C O M P A N Y Silvercloud has raised more than €8 million in funding, the Irish Examiner has reported.

the intersection between technology and psychological treatment. The Dublin-based company was founded in 2012 and hopes to create 65 new jobs after this latest round of investment.

The company offers a range of online services designed to help people manage mental health and behavioural health issues such as depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and the psychological effects of chronic illness.

Based around cognitive behaviour therapy, a typical program sees a user complete a 30-40 minute session once a week for a period of 8-10 weeks. For example, users suffering from anxiety work through a series of modules and make use of tools such as an ‘anxiety monitor chart’, designed to help them better understand and challenge their anxious thoughts. A trained psychologist reviews the user’s progress.

Silvercloud began life as a research project in Trinity that looked at the

One programme offered by Silvercloud, ‘Space from Depression’, was the

subject of a clinical trial published in 2015. 180 people participated in a randomised controlled trial in 2014. Over half of the test subjects were either in remission or had recovered from their symptoms, after completion of the seven modules composing the programme, and these improvements were maintained three and six months after the intervention. Silvercloud generates the bulk of its sales (98%) outside of Ireland. In the UK, the company’s largest single market, Silvercloud services are used by universities, the Ministry of Defence, and one third of National Health Service (NHS) Trusts. The US, Germany, Austria and Switzerland are also large markets for the firm.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Leadership Race 2017

News

Presidential and Welfare sabbatical roles are the only contested positions in Leadership Race Five people are running for Welfare, while UT Editor is uncontested for third year in a row Niamh Lynch News Editor

Sinead Harrington Deputy News Editor

Stacey Wrenn DeputyFeatures Editor

W E L V E STUDENTS WERE ANNOUNCED to be running in the 2017 Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) sabbatical officer elections outside House 6 last Friday with Kevin Keane, Bryan Mallon, and Thomas Emmet running for the role of TCDSU president. Kevin Keane is a fourth year Law student and deputy chair of the TCDSU lobby group.

Thomas Emmet is a fourth year History student and the current Environmental Officer in TCDSU. Bryan Mallon is a fourth year Irish Studies student. He is the vice chairperson of the Fianna Fail Wolfe Tone Cumann, and Chairperson of DU Gaelic Football Club. The position of education officer is running uncontested this year. Alice MacPherson is a 4th year TSM History and English student. She is the current Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences convener and secretary to the TCDSU education committee. The welfare officer position continues to be popular, with five students running for the position this year. Laura Grady is a second year Economics and Sociology student. She is the volunteer coordinator on TCDSU’s

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The welfare officer position continues to be popular, with five students running for the position this year.

welfare committee. Emma Purser is a fourth year World Religions and Theology student and the current School of Religions, Theology and Peace Studies convener within TCDSU. Damian McClean is a fourth year Mathematics student. He is the current citizenship officer in TCDSU and the LGBT Rights Officer in TCDSU in 2014/15. Rachel Skelly is a third year Geography student. In April 2016 she was elected to the position of gender equality officer at TCDSU. Meabh Cullen is a third year Environmental Science student and the current disability officer for TCDSU. Communications and marketing officer is running uncontested this year. Úna Harty is a third year Nanoscience, Chemistry and Physics of Advanced

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Dominic McGrath is the uncontested candidate for editor of The University Times... the third year in a row that

the position is unopposed.

Materials student. She is the Irish officer for TCDSU and is also the PRO of Trinity Publications. The candidate for entertainments officer are Jonah Craig, third year Computer Science and Business student and current treasurer of Trinity Ents. This race is also uncontested. Dominic McGrath is the uncontested candidate for editor of The University Times, making this the third year in a row that the position is unopposed. He is a third year Law and Political Science student and the current deputy editor of The University Times. Campaigning officially begins with postering on February 14 and concludes with the results on February 23.

Leadership Race 2017: Candidate Profiles

Five people are running for Welfare, while UT Editor is uncontested for third year in a row

President

Bryan Mallon: Bryan Mallon is a Senior Sophister Irish Studies student. From Julianstown in County Meath, Mallon is the chairperson of Dublin University Gaelic Football Club (DUGAA) and vice chairperson of the Fianna Fáil Wolfe Tone Cumann. His previous position in DUGAA have been as public relations and social media officer. He served as class rep for Irish Studies in the 2015/2016 academic year.

Thomas Emmet: Thomas Emmet is a Senior Sophister History student. From Kilpedder in Co. Wicklow, Emmet is the current Environmental Officer in TCDSU and also co-chairs the Green Campus committee in College, which saw Trinity receive its second green flag. He previously spent one year studying English and Film in University College Dublin (UCD), where he was class rep, before dropping out and beginning in Trinity. Emmet also held the position of class rep in his third year. He is the current treasurer of DU History and was an editor of the Trinity Film Review last year.

Education

Kevin Keane: From Castleknock in Co. Dublin, Kevin Keane is a Senior Sophister Law student and currently the president of Suas Trinity. He taught at a school in India for three months through Suas’ 2014 Volunteer Programme. Keane is also involved in numerous clubs and societies on campus, ranging from An Cumman Gaelach to the basketball team. Within TCDSU, he was on the welfare committee last year and is now the deputy chair of the lobby group.

Comms & Marketing Úna Harty: Úna Harty is a Junior Sophister Nanoscience, Chemistry and Physics of Advanced Materials student from Limerick. She has been the Society and College Life Editor at Trinity News this year and is the PRO of Trinity Publications, as well as editing STAND, the official magazine of Suas Trinity. She is a graphic and layout designer for tn2 magazine and committee member of the Central Societies’ Committee (CSC). A Gaeilgeoir, Harty is also very involved with the Cumann Gaelach and is TCDSU’s Irish Officer. Úna has been extensively involved in DU Players, including serving as the Freshers’ Fest Director for the society. She has presented several shows on Trinity FM and is now Senior Sound Engineer at the station. Outside of college, Úna writes for the lifestyle and food websites lovindublin. com and lovin.ie.

Ents Jonah Craig: Jonah Craig is a third year Computer Science and Business student from Sligo. He is the current treasurer of Trinity Ents and a committee member of DU Business and Economics Society (DUBES). He runs the club night BoraBora with four of his friends. He was the Trinity Hall JCR’s entertainment officer last year and was previously an Ents rep as a Junior Freshman.

University Times Editor Dominic McGrath: Dominic McGrath is a third year Law and Political Science student from Omagh and is the current deputy editor of the University Times. He began in the publication as a staff writer and later deputy news editor, before being appointed news editor in his second year.

Alice MacPherson: Alice MacPherson is a final year TSM History and English student originally from Newcastle in the north of England. MacPherson has been very involved in TCDSU, from becoming class rep for English TSM in her Senior Freshman year, to being the Deputy Faculty Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences convener last year. This year she is serving as the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences convener and secretary to the TCDSU education committee. She has also partaken in the Women in Leadership campaign, which aims to increase female participation in student politics. During her time in Trinity, MacPherson has volunteered with the Voluntary Tuition Programme.

Welfare Emma Purser: Emma Purser is a Senior Sophister World Religions and Theology student from Co. Laois, and is a current member of the TCDSU Lobby Group. She is currently the convenor of the School of Religions, Theology and Peace Studies within TCDSU. She is a committee member of the TCD Chapel and an S2S Peer Supporter. She has been an SU class rep since 2014. Previously, Purser was the public relations officer (PRO) of the SU Welfare Committee (2015/2016). Outside TCDSU, Emma is the secretary of Young Fine Gael (YFG) Leinster Regional Council and is on the Amber Flag YFG committee, which focuses on mental health issues. Within YFG, her roles have ranged from chair of the party’s Laois branch, to PRO and member of the digital team. Meabh Cullen: Meabh Cullen is a Junior Sophister Environmental Science student from Naas in Co. Kildare. She currently holds the position of disability officer with TCDSU. She has been an ambassador for the Student Disability Service for the past two years. In the past, Meabh has been an active member of both the Trampolining Society and DU Players. Laura Grady: Laura Grady is a Senior Freshman Economics and Sociology student from Sligo. She holds the position of volunteer coordinator on the TCDSU’s welfare committee and was a committee member with the College Historical Society (the Hist) earlier this year. She has been involved in campaigns such as Body and Soul Week, and has volunteered with St Vincent de Paul and Special Olympics Ireland. She was awarded Class Rep of the Year for 2015/2016 at TCDSU Council in April, and is a writer for Trinity News. Damien McClean: Damien McClean, who is a Senior Sophister Mathematics student from Louth, currently holds the position of citizenship officer in TCDSU. He is a global student ambassador working in the Global Room and was on the Green Week Committee this year. McClean was also the TCDSU LGBT Rights Officer in 2014/15. In this role, he was heavily involved in the Yes Equality campaign, organising a voter registration drive before the marriage equality referendum, and has been involved in lobbying efforts with the Transgender Equality Network Ireland (TENI). During his time in Trinity, McClean has been the convener for the School of Maths, a Climbing Society committee member, and an S2S mentor. Outside Trinity, Damien has worked with the Association for Higher Education and Disability (AHEAD) and was a carer and support counsellor for Spina Bifida Hydrocephalus Ireland (SBHI). Rachel Skelly: Rachel Skelly, from Clontarf in Dublin, is a Junior Sophister student of Geography. In April 2016, she was elected to the position of TCDSU Gender Equality Officer. In this role, Skelly oversaw a campaign to discuss gender issues such as sexual consent and the mental health of young men. This campaign also provided support for the then newlyestablished sexual consent workshops. Skelly sits on a six-person steering committee overseeing these workshops, along with current Welfare Officer Aoibhinn Ní Lochlainn.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

News

Vice President of British National Trinity researchers Union of Students filmed make breakthrough in discussing plans to oust President oesophageal cancer treatment

The revelation comes after an undercover Al Jazeera investigation into the British Israeli embassyteam and their efforts to influence British internal politics. Riain Fitzsimons Staff Wrter

ICHARD BROOKS, A SENIOR OFFICIAL in the National Union of Students (NUS), the national union for third level students in Britain, has been secretly filmed discussing plans to oust the organisation’s president Malia Bouattia. Brooks, a vice president in the British equivalent to the USI, was filmed during an undercover investigation by an Al Jazeera reporter into the Israeli embassy in the UK. In the secret recording, Brooks admits to organising a faction against Bouattia. In response to a question from the undercover reporter as to how they could get in touch with people who wanted to oppose Bouattia, Brooks

is heard saying: “You can speak to me, because I’m helping organise them.” The investigation also found that the Israeli embassy helps fund the Union of Jewish Students (UJS). Bouattia, a known critic of Israel and pro-Palestine activist, considers herself an “opponent of Zionist politics”. Opponents of Bouattia have accused her of anti-semitism, a claim she denies. Brooks admits on camera that he held “secret purpose meetings” with senior members of the UJS “where we’d plan how to get moderate people with good politics and any number of things elected to certain places”. Since the revelation, there have been calls on social media for Brooks to resign. This comes wider scandal British Israeli an embassy

as part of a regarding the embassy after official, Shai

TCDSU Council to vote on motion supporting free third level education Motion mandates support for “taxpayer funded, free education for all” Cathal Kavanagh Investigations Editor

RINITY COLLEGE D U B L I N STUDENTS Union (TCDSU) is to debate and vote on a Students Against Fees (SAF) motion at TCDSU Council on Tuesday January 24, which calls for a strengthening of the Union’s stance on fees and loans, and explicitly mandates a campaign for a publiclyfunded system of higher education. The motion, which is proposed by Conor Reddy, Secretary of Students Against Fees, and seconded by TCDSU President Kieran McNulty, notes that TCDSU “does not have a formal position on how higher education should be funded”. However, the Union of Students in Ireland (USI) does have a policy calling on the government to introduce a publicly-funded system. As a result of a motion in the 201516 academic year, the current TCDSU stance is against the further increases of fees only, without advocating a new model of funding. According to Reddy, that after some hesitation, the motion has the support of TCDSU President, Kieran McNulty, with back and forth taking place between the two groups before reaching agreement on the final motion. Reddy, who is also the TCDSU Science Convener and the Amenities Officer of Trinity People Before Profit (PBP), said that the group behind the motion realised that the Union “didn’t have a position” on the issue and

decided to “put something more solid forward”. The motion calls for a free, publicly funded model of higher education, which Reddy noted was one of the potential options outlined in the Cassells Report which was released in July 2016. “There was no real vision to” the current motion, he said. “It’s time to get off the fence.” Speaking to Trinity News, McNulty said: “We’re kind of at a crossroads with the higher education funding system at the minute, and it can probably go one of two ways.” He continued: “Loan systems in Britain and Australia have major problems and pitfalls” and “it’s naive to think we could do loans better than the UK, or do it better than Australia”. He emphasised, however, that any move to a single-payer system of higher education “won’t happen overnight”, and that the issue required continued and increased investment in order to increase access and opportunity. As it stands in the published Agenda to Council, the motion mandates a “formal position against fees and income contingent loans in all forms and that the Union support tax-payer funded, free education for all”. A newer version of the motion also involves a call for “a campaign set up to reform the SUSI grant, expanding the window of eligibility, and also taking into account the increased cost of living in cities”. Reddy also said that the group is organising for a series of speakers to advocate passing the motion, with both himself and McNulty confident of it passing.

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Bouattia considers herself an “opponent of Zionist politics”

Masot, was filmed saying he would “take down” British MPs who expressed antiIsrael opinions. The official also admitted that the embassy had helped establish pro-Israeli political groups across the UK. This has led MPs to call for the expulsion of Israeli diplomats. The investigation also implicated former chair of Labour Students and parliamentary officer of the Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) group, Michael Rubin, in the move against Bouattia. Rubin is filmed admitting that he worked closely with Masot but that “a lot of it is behind the scenes”. Prior to becoming the LFI’s parliamentary officer, Rubin helped run the NUS presidential campaign for Megan Dunn, who ran against Bouattia’s successful campaign.

The discovery was made by Ussher Assistant Professor of Translational Oncology, Dr Stephen Maher, and his team Jake Trant Senior Reporter

R I N I T Y RESEARCHERS HAVE MADE a groundbreaking discovery that could fight resistance to radiotherapy in cases of oesophageal cancer. The new discovery made by Dr Stephen Maher, Ussher Assistant Professor of Translational Oncology, and his team - which includes scientists from Trinity College, St James’s Hospital, the Coombe Women and Infants University Hospital, and the University of Hull - could help to overcome a major obstacle to treatment of oesophageal cancer. Their research, which was published in the scientific journal Oncotarget, has revealed that the loss of a powerful gene-regulating molecule called miR-17 from cancer stem cells plays an important role in

driving oesophageal tumour resistance to radiotherapy.

Currently resistance to radiotherapy is a major problem relating to oesophageal cancer, with the majority of patients having some form of resistance, resulting in delays in surgery. The research, largely funded by the Health Research Board (HRB), demonstrated that populations of tumour cells that had higher numbers of cancer stem cells formed larger, more aggressive tumours. They demonstrated that the cancer stem cells were more resistant to radiation-induced cell death. The research also showed that the population of cancer stem cells could be further broken down into smaller groups, which had distinct radiation sensitivity profiles. Further genetic analysis revealed that the levels of miR-17 were particularly low in the cancer stem cells that were most resistant to radiation. In patient samples, miR-17 was found to be much

lower in the tumours of patients who did not respond to treatment. The work also made the key discovery that by placing a synthetic version of miR-17 into the resistant cells, they became more sensitive to radiation which the team believe could be used to enhance the effectiveness of radiotherapy treatment in the future. Dr Maher described the research as: “extremely important in understanding why tumours are inherently resistant to radiotherapy, and how they can acquire resistance”. Oesophageal cancer is a major problem in Ireland and the rest of the western world. Cases of this type of cancer have increased by 600% over the past three decades, making it the largest increase in incidence of any disease of any kind over the same time period. Rates are expected to continue increasing over the next 20 years.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Features

Seana Davis investigates some of the latest advances to tackle climate change page 8

Delving into Trinity’s Societal Past As college resumes and society memberships are culled, Jane Purdom looks into some of the largest societies and how they contribute to the living history of the college Jane Purdom Staff Writer

HEN IT COMES TO the role of societies in Trinity, there are few that would argue that the pooled activities of these societies have ultimately shaped the actions, involvements and general psyche of the present student body. But as we look back on the collective history of these pivotal organisations, one may come to understand how they emerged as dominant groups in the college today. Indeed, the history of some of the societies are quite fascinating, with scandals and legends that still contribute to the heritage and character of these societies today. The Hist’s 1815 exit from the college is only one of many such occurrences that comes to mind - when the society actually left the university, due to many of its members being expelled. These expulsions came about due to the Hist’s hosting of a debate discussing if Brutus was justifiable in putting Julius Caesar to death. The society was only reformed within Trinity in 1843, after a sizable student petition and an agreement that the society would no longer discuss political affairs. Looking at past societies in this way, through such fascinating snippets of history, does in some way enable us to engage with Trinity’s societal past and the college as a whole. However, perhaps the only way to truly immerse ourselves in this history requires a closer, more thorough examination of the past by placing ourselves in Trinity 50 years ago.

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The Astronomy and Space Society, the Karting Society, the Speech and Language Pathology Society and most recently the One World Society are a few to appear on the list of disbanded organisations.

The logical place to begin researching this time in Trinity’s history was found in “Trinity Tales: Trinity College Dublin in the Seventies”, a collection of essay-style memoirs. These pieces painted a vibrant and exciting decade of change

and development for both societies and the college as a whole. Considering this source in isolation, it is easy to imagine societies having an even more influential role on the student experience than they do today – acting as powerful driving forces of innovation and progress that integrated the student body into one radical movement. However, Roy Foster’s review of this collection points out that while this is true to some extent, the actual idea of trying to paint an accurate picture of societal life in Trinity 50 years ago is fundamentally flawed – those that disengaged, or had negative experiences, simply would not come forward. We are therefore left with a romanticized version of events that we must attempt to detangle from reality. As social reforms and revolutions were so prevalent amongst students in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, my research took me back to the foundation of what we now know as QSoc. A brief examination of this society’s history offers impressive credentials – being Ireland’s oldest LGBTQ+ organisation is a prime example. It is only with a closer and more personal look at the story of Qsoc can we truly understand what the foundation of this society meant for the Trinity student 50 years ago. Indeed, this is perhaps a prime example of the differences in actuality and romanticizing past events. According to the current society and its past members, the society was initially viewed as a novelty by the general student body – it was defined by its obscurity and simply did not receive the mainstream support that it does today. When we consider this in context of the social and political norms of the time, it is not surprising. However, it is only when we

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According to the current society and its past members, the society was initially viewed as a novelty by the general student body – it was defined by its obscurity and simply did not receive the mainstream support that it does today.

take steps like this that we truly begin to paint a picture of what societal life was like for students of the college 50 years ago – when we separate concrete facts from the mood and experiences of individuals at the time. A brief look at the Trinity News archives is an accurate route to engage with the reality of the times. Articles from the early 1970s hotly debate values now taken as a given by the wider student body: gender equality, human rights advocacy & the ratio of Catholics to Protestants in the college. Comparing these articles with those of today’s – where we are challenging the definitions of gender as society perceives them, the passionate calls to repeal the 8th amendment highlighted how much times have changed. Of course the history of the colleges oldest society, the University Philosophical Society (or the Phil as it is most commonly known), must be considered when researching the societal past of Trinity. An examination of the minutes of meetings from 50 years back offers a valuable insight into what involvement in the society meant for a student. These records indicate a more formalised time – notice was taken when committee members were late for meetings, and fining for minor offenses was seldom, but not as unheard of as it is today. However, from studying these snapshots of the society’s history, noticing how they were so diligently kept, the passion of members back then mirrored that of students today. It is perhaps this enthusiasm and love of

involvement that appears so continuous can be considered in understanding the society’s consistent emergence as a pivotal contributor to societal life here at Trinity. These records really captured the interests and values of students at the time, in a way that looking at secondary sources simply cannot do. Considering the contextual and actual history of existing societies is a fascinating challenge that offers a more genuine and in depth answer to what societal life was actually like in the college fifty years ago. Another valuable way of painting a picture of this, and that is also commonly overlooked, involves looking at societies that cease to exist. In order to research this chapter of Trinity’s past, research involved sourcing a list of disbanded societies from within the university and then attempting to find articles from these organisation’s times that may offer information regarding their role within Trinity, and how they ceased to be. This task proved challenging as information was limited and scattered. Anecdotal information from current students leads certain stories come to mind but this only leads to more questions about possible societies that didn’t make it to the anecdotal hall of fame. The list of no longer existent societies is varied and certainly doesn’t offer any indication of the criteria for a lasting organisation. The Astronomy and Space Society, the Karting Society, the Speech and Language Pathology Society, and most recently the One World

Society are a few to appear on the list of disbanded organisations. My research - which involved everything from skimming old articles from the relevant period, to looking at the actual records kept by the Phil, definitely enabled me to understand that the past societal life of Trinity was much more complex than initially presumed. From a closer examination, looking at records and examining the facts on a more contextual level, I was able to see how often the actual reality of what a society was for students differs from what is often presumed. My research into the Phil enabled me to understand the stark differences in culture and society, differences that simply cannot be observed at surface level analysis. Furthermore, the meticulous records kept enabled me to understand just how much involvement in this society meant to students in the past – appearing to hugely shape their experiences of university. My research of QSoc mirrored similar findings, highlighting the value that the society had in pioneering social movements of the time. This journey into the history of Trinity led me to wonder how our own societies would be perceived 50 years from now. Would technology and the volume of information that it enables us to keep lead to more accurate and better representations? Or, is the mood and understanding of a college and its student organisations simply too complex to capture fully?

The Rise of le Front National Mia Colleran explores the popularity of the right wing party Le Front National in the upcoming French presidential elections Mia Colleran Deputy Features Editor

HE CANDIDATES IN LIGHT of Brexit and the recent election of Donald Trump, many people fear that a right-wing populism is sweeping across the globe and all eyes are turned to the upcoming French presidential elections to see if this trend will continue. In the past fifty-nine years, France has only elected two presidents from the Socialist Party, François Mitterand in 1995 and the current president, François Hollande. Hollande was the first French president in recent history not to seek re-election and is also the most unpopular president of in the history of the Fifth Republic. According to polls in November 2016, Hollande’s approval rating was at 4% and it was predicted that were he to run for re-election he would be defeated in the first round. Hollande is set to finish his term in May 2017. The first round of voting for the presidential election takes place on April 23rd and if no majority vote is obtained by any candidate, the top two candidates will proceed to the next and final round of voting on May 7th. As of now, there are four presidential candidates announced. Emmanuel Macron, leader of the newly founded centralist

party En Marche, announced his presidency on November 16th. The Republican Presidential Primary took place on November 20th and then again on the 27th because no candidate obtained a 50% majority in the first round. This was the first time that on Open Primary was held for the Republicans. François Fillon obtained a 66.5% majority in the second round and was selected as the presidential candidate for the Republican Party for 2017. Marine Le Pen, leader of the right wing, nationalist and populist party the Front National announced her second presidential campaign in September. She ran in 2012 but lost, failed to make it to the second, run-off round, coming third overall, achieving 17.9% of votes. JeanLuc Mélenchon, founder of the new political movement Unsubmissive France is also a presidential candidate. Mélenchon also ran against Marine Le Pen and François Hollande in the 2012 elections and came in fourth place with 11.1% of the votes. The fifth presidential candidate for 2017 will be announced next week on the 22nd of January at the Socialist Party Presidential Primary with the the first round of voting to be held on January 29th. The Front National In recent years, Marine Le Pen has tried to reform and soften the image of the Front

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In recent years, Marine Le Pen has tried to reform and soften the image of the Front National in a process entitled ‘dedemonization’

National in a process entitled ‘de-demonization’. When her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, was head of the party it faced frequent criticism for the controversial views of its members. However, since Marine Le Pen’s election as leader of the party in 2011 there have been large increases in support for the party. She notably expelled her father in 2015 after he repeatedly referred to Nazi gas chambers as: ‘‘a point of detail of the history of the Second World War’’. Le Pen has focused on Hollande’s staid policies, contrasting them with her own party to further an image of the Front National as a party for change. In December 2016 the Front National was supposedly the most popular political party for people between the ages of 18-34 according to an OdoxaDentsu Consulting Poll; however, the mood among the French youth is one of anger and disgust towards the presidential candidates. Since 1984, the Front National has been a significant force for French nationalism. Marine Le Pen promised to hold a referendum on France’s membership of the European Union within six months if she were elected president, saying that she wished to ‘‘stop the erosion of national borders’’, and has hinted that she would resign as president if the vote failed. Le Pen won’t officially launch her campaign until February 2017, following the

Socialist Party Presidential Primary, however the Front National is known for its anti-EU stance and its strong criticism of open borders and globalisation. Marine Le Pen has said that she would like to reinstate the French franc, at parity with the Euro, and desires that in ‘‘any area of public provisions should go to the French before foreigners’’. Last week, she visited Trump Tower in New York and has consistently praised Donald Trump throughout his campaign, calling his election, ‘‘an additional stone in the building of a new world’’ on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show in November 2016”. A radically right-wing France? As of January 19th Marine Le Pen is polling at between 25-26% in the first round of the presidential election, according to the poll conducted by Ipsos Sopra Steria for Le Monde, a French daily newspaper, and François Fillon is polling at about 1% behind her. It is unclear whether or not Le Pen will win the election. One can only imagine the upheaval that would be caused if France left the European Union, which Le Pen has compared to a “system of the oppression of peoples”. Guido Lombardi, a friend and neighbour of Donald Trump, has gone so far as to call Le Pen ‘The French Trump’ during Le Pen’s visit to Trump Tower.

It is clear from the polls that the real race is between François Fillon and Marine Le Pen. One very

important point is that of the three main candidates — Emmanuel Macron, Francois Fillon, and Marie Le Pen — Le Pen is the only one not to have previously been in government, and it’s likely that voters will remember that. Macron was Minister of the Economy, Industry and Digital Affairs until 30 August 2016 and François Fillon was Prime Minister to Nicolas Sarkozy in 2007-2012. France is deeply dissatisfied and there’s no doubt that this presidential election is one of the most important France has seen in a long time, particularly since the terrorist attacks in Paris and Nice. Although the Front National has had a candidate running in the presidential election since 2002, they haven’t yet won and it’s likely that this is the best year yet for them. Either way, the next president of the Fifth Republic will have many difficult and

Credit: Jenny Corcoran divisive issues to tackle, and furthermore they’ll have to regain the trust and respect of the French. Whether or not France will remain in the EU is a question that can only be answered with time; however if the polls continue the way they are, France could be the next to feel the wave of rightwing populism with a Front National president leading them.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Features

Study Abroad: what it’s really like to do an exchange far, far from Trinity Caoimhe Gordon speaks to four students who chose to spend a year studying in far flung locations

Caoimhe Gordon Contributing Writer

VERY YEAR, THE OPPORTUNITY presents itself for students to take a leap of faith, leave the cobbled paths of Front Square behind for a semester or two in order to fulfil their academic destiny of studying in a college far, far away. While some opt for the countries of Europe to finetune their language skills or to avail of continental living by becoming enamoured with cheap bus services to cities far and wide, others are more partial to far-flung locations. These students fill our newsfeeds with pictures from various jaunts around America, Australia and Asia. Apart from all the photo ops, what is it really like to participate in an exchange far from home? Claire McGregor, JS History – North America My first impression upon arriving at Notre Dame was surprise at how much it lived up to the classic American college stereotype. Everything from the dorm rooms (and roommates), dining halls and cheerleaders to beer-pong at keg fuelled house-parties and the football games was exactly like the movies. One of the first differences I quickly discovered about studying in the States was the attitude to going to lectures and classes. Everyone buys all the required books for class before the start of term and nobody tends to frequently miss class (in most modules 3 missed classes is an automatic fail). It was a real eye-opener when my 9am Tuesday class was consistently full, and not missing most students busy sleeping off last night’s Dicey’s (although I suppose I would have the same attitude if my tuition was $68,000 a year). Constant papers, mid-terms, finals and quizzes keep you very busy throughout the year, so in terms of teaching they do somewhat get their money’s worth. The dorm system in Notre Dame really takes care of you. In addition to getting fed in a dining hall everyday it does feel like your independence has taken a few steps back from studying and living in Dublin. I’ve always been a mediocre cook, so I’m quite happy to have my meals made for me every day and it is an incredibly convenient, if slightly repetitive ‘boarding school-esque’ system. The isolated campus, complete with two lakes, a basilica, and picturesque tree-lined running paths is a far-cry from city centre Trinity and does provide a slightly more relaxing environment, although I do miss the easy availability of shops, cafes, pubs and clubs. The nightlife around Notre Dame essentially consists of three pretty grimy dive bars or intensely sweaty on-campus ‘dorm parties’. Football is like

a religion here and tailgates before the games are not optional if you have any sort of social life. Also EVERYBODY follows the team and actually gets significantly upset if we lose. The November election was a very bizarre and shocking experience because Notre Dame is reasonably unique among the larger US colleges as being a very conservative, Catholic school where many students would be from Republican backgrounds. While I encountered many students and staff who had the standard European, liberal, democratic views that we in Trinity are so used to, I was surprised by how many young, highly educated people I met who were willing to support and vote for Trump so that they weren’t voting ‘against their party’, or who had decided to abstain or were simply not registered to vote at all. From talking to friends in Californian universities I know my mid-western American election experience was very different from theirs, where the result provoked campus-wide mourning and demonstrations. Although I do miss Trinity, studying in Notre Dame is an amazing experience, the sporting opportunities are incredible, the students are generally very friendly and the staff are very keen to help you out. The opportunity to use the exchange as a base to travel around the states and Canada is not one I would easily give up (although the lack of an American Ryanair equivalent means it can get pretty pricey!). Catherine Corrigan, former BESS student - Shanghai Shanghai may seem like an unusual choice for an exchange and it might not have the same lure as American colleges but it was definitely one of the best choices I made while at Trinity. As a business and economics student the opportunity to get a chance to study and live in one of the biggest financial hubs in the world was second to none. It was a very challenging and very rewarding opportunity and one I couldn’t recommend enough to anyone sitting on the fence about applying to study in China. As a student with no Mandarin, simple tasks could be a lot more taxing, and there was nothing to prepare us for the culture shock, but Shanghai was a really international city to live in. By the time I left, I could order my food, negotiate in the markets and speak to my taxi drivers, so what more did I need? Although we all had those days where we didn’t really know what we were eating! The best thing about studying in Shanghai was learning about the Chinese perspective on how to do business and how to operate in an economy like China, where regulations seem tougher and internet restrictions are tighter. Another amazing

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Everything from the dorm rooms (and roommates), dining halls, cheerleaders, beer-pong at keg fuelled house-parties and the football games was exactly like the movies.

opportunity was created by the Irish chamber of commerce that set up a mentorship programme for the Irish students to meet with those working in Shanghai which meant I got to go to the LEGO offices, the Apple offices and EY! This was a great way to get direct contact with people that are doing business in China and it was one of the best ways to learn. While I was away I was just enjoying my time, meeting people, going to classes and enjoying the nightlife Shanghai had on offer - which included ladies’ night in some of the most exclusive places in the city! What I didn’t realise at the time was how much my experience was going to help me in the future. Every final year class I took in business centred on China because of its global importance and those topics just became second nature for me. It was tough and challenging and some days I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry but when all was said and done I would do it all over again and I’m so jealous of anyone that gets the opportunity to go. I never thought I would study somewhere as far away as China but I’m so glad I did it and I learned so much inside, as well as outside, the classroom! Kerry Dwyer, JS BESS Singapore In order to understand studying in Singapore, it is necessary to have a basic understanding of Singapore as a whole. For anyone who has seen or read The Hunger Games, the island’s one-party system does not differ hugely. With a rigorous legal system that still includes the death penalty, anyone who steps out of line will know all about it. However, the island is a pretty easy place to live with neighbourhoods planned to have equal proportions of every ethnicity, impressively low levels of homelessness, spotless streets (without a public bin in sight) and extremely efficient transport. Singapore Management University (SMU) could be seen as an emblem of Singapore – spotless, orderly, happy, safe and successful, but also partially pretentious, rigid and narrow minded. As SMU is the youngest university in a quickly developing country, their enthusiasm for education is one that cannot go unremarked from the moment you step foot in the complex. As a management university it is a great place to network, attend talks by different CEOs and gain an insight into the way they think about business and economics from an Eastern perspective but also from a number of other views in a country that is so multicultural and has quite a Western focus too. The modern, high-comfort facilities they provide highlight the importance with which they regard their students and ensuring they fulfil their potential. With

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. . . we all had those days where we didn’t really know what we were eating!

personal study booths, group project rooms, learning labs, multiple lounge and ‘nap’ areas as well as a food court, cafes and access to a brand new gym, they leave you with no excuse to venture far from the library. This excuse however, is not something Singaporean students look for. SMU could be compared to Wall Street in a way. While the students there are the best of the best, they are under massive pressure from a ‘GPA race’ to get the returns from their investments, or the results from their study. For many SMU students, studying is a form of enjoyment. Overnight stays in the library are not uncommon and in fact, they are considered an achievement to boast about. Apart from the importance of results, SMU places a major emphasis on group project work. Unlike at home where we avoid any sort of presentation at all costs, SMU students seek it out and modules with greater result weighting for presentations tend to be in higher demand. I ended up being unable to avoid presentations even though the majority of my courses were finance based and would usually entail a very small amount of group work. Having had five presentations this semester, I was forced out of my comfort zone and into an area of expertise among SMU students. Even their PowerPoint skills were on another level to ours, meaning I couldn’t even offer to put the presentation together to avoid presenting. The campus reminds me of a ‘sci-fi’, modern Trinity in a way. Situated in the city centre, right at the top of the famous, bustling Orchard Road, the discipline not to finish up early and go for a bit of window shopping or for a few drinks with friends is something we could learn from. Or maybe it’s just the outrageous cost of alcohol and shopping that makes the La Ka Shing library more attractive… Christopher Barry, Final Year BBS – Sydney, Australia From my experience, being on exchange is the easy part. It was the getting there that was far more strenuous. Between applications, exams, waiting, more waiting, emailing, phoning and more waiting, the end of January finally arrived and I was ready for the big move for semester two of third year. Sydney was a place that had always fascinated me, largely due to a seven-year allegiance to Home and Away that helped get me through secondary school. This was usually followed by a laugh by most locals because, as it turns out, very few of them actually watch it. Having arrived after spending an exhilarating month in New Zealand, a truly beautiful and wonderful country, I was fortunate to arrive in Oz halfway through February, which was nearing the end of its summer. Throughout my

time I became accustomed to constant blue skies, one of the biggest differences compared to Ireland. Living in student accommodation helped massively in meeting new people and I made friends for life, some of whom I have already met up with in Berlin. The high standards of the University of Sydney, although expected, was still a pleasant surprise. As a Business student, I was fortunate enough to be part of the first cohort of students that occupied their new modern building. It made me a little jealous of future Business students here in Trinity! Studying four modules over there, my final pick was randomly enough, Environmental Politics. This was by far the most interesting module I have ever taken and has sparked an interest that I expect will last far beyond my six months in Australia. Another standout experience was having dinner with George Bush’s former speechwriter and a close friend of the Clintons – a totally bizarre situation that could only happen on exchange! One huge advantage in going to an English speaking country was not only did it make meeting people infinitely easier, but everyday tasks like going to the shop for example, were made so much simpler by not having a language barrier in place. This was a common complaint I heard from friends who were in places like Germany and France. Despite all the crazy cultures you fly over on your way to Australia, they do share a lot in common with the Irish, like not taking themselves too seriously and generally enjoying themselves. Sydney itself was pretty expensive but getting a job over there certainly helped minimize the costs – the minimum wage was $18 dollars (nearly €12 an hour). The living costs were similar to those in Dublin, although travelling across this massive country could be pricey. The truth is, however, when you’re swimming in the Great Barrier Reef, sunning yourself on Bondi beach or hanging out by the Opera House, all the hard work of getting there, via summer jobs and studying for exams, made it all worth it - and more. To first years considering going away, and second years looking forward to their exchange next year, I can only speak from my own experience in saying that my time in Australia was far beyond anything I could have ever imagined. The lifestyle over there is a far cry from an average day in Dublin. If you’re doubtful about going, take a chance. Academically you’ll benefit from a totally different way of learning and teaching, and by the time you’re ready to come home you’ll have survived at least one semester by yourself in a totally different country – quite a feat, all things considered!

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Features

A Divorce From Tradition: 20 years on Ciarán Sunderland looks back on Ireland’s divorce referendums in 1986 and 1995, from proposal to passing, and how the result changed in 1995 to lift the constitutional ban on divorce. Ciarán Sunderland Contributing Writer

N 24 NOVEMBER 1995 Ireland voted to overturn a longstanding constitutional ban on divorce. The referendum passed with a slim margin of just 0.3%. A previous referendum in 1986 had failed to pass when the Irish electorate rejected lifting a ban on divorce by a margin of 25%. In the 1980s, Former Fine Gael Taoiseach Garret Fitzgerald began a constitutional crusade in an attempt to modernise the Irish constitution and make it more compatible with Northern Irish society. It was hoped that this would improve the relationship between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. In June 1986, a referendum was held on divorce by the Fine Gael/ Labour Coalition government. Fitzgerald had the support of the liberal wing of his party, such as former Minister of Education Gemma Hussey. However skepticism from conservative wings of the party was not absent with Minister for Defence, Patrick Cooney, a prominent objector. Another TD to speak out against the referendum was Fine Gael TD Alice Glenn who, in a speech to the Dáil, observed that: “The Constitution is to protect the family but a women cast aside is not a family. She becomes a non-person. She loses all protection under the Constitution. The wife and children are diminished. But the opposite happens to the male. He will have formed an alliance with somebody in the workforce who is bringing in plenty of money. That is all he is interested in. This is what has happened everywhere else and it will happen here. It occurs to me that any women voting for divorce is like a Turkey voting for Christmas”. Fianna Fáil were officially neutral on the matter, however, many Fianna Fáil party members were privately against divorce. Charles Haughey, for example, sought to discredit the government through opposition, campaigning covertly for a no vote. The campaign was on the

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“It occurs to me that any women voting for divorce is like a Turkey voting for Christmas” – Fine Gael TD Alice Glenn.

defensive from the outset and was unable to provide answers concerning property rights and social welfare. There was particular anxiety in rural areas, where it was feared family farms would be divided up in the event of divorce. Questions of women's rights to property following divorce were also left unanswered as Irish Independent columnist Mary Kenny noted in a conversation with Trinity News: “Rural Ireland was fearful about the division of farmland that might follow a divorce, and women (including some feminists) were ambivalent about their property rights after divorce. (This was particularly an issue in 1986, when women’s property rights were not secured in the event of a marriage dissolution)”. These fears were targeted by a strong opposition led by Catholic Bishops and funded by Catholic groups in the US. In the week preceding the referendum, William Binchy, then Regius Professor of Laws at Trinity College (1992 to 2012) and a conservative barrister, argued persuasively on television against the divorce referendum citing lack of safeguards for social welfare entitlements, in particular for children's allowances. A week later on 26 June 1986, the divorce referendum was defeated by a majority of 935,843 against, and 538,279 in favour. It would take nine years for another referendum to be held in Ireland on the matter. While the referendum was ultimately successful, the margin of victory was so tight (50.3% to 49.7%), that an official recount was ordered. Prominent No campaigner Úna Bean Mhic Mhathúna infamously shouted “Get away, ye wife swapping sodomites” at journalists and opposition campaign members during a recount which showed that the public veered in the direction of a Yes vote. The small margin of victory was carried by Dublin which voted largely in favour while turnout in the West of Ireland, a No campaign stronghold, was dampened by wet weather conditions. Also a slight

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Prominent No campaigner Una Bean Mhic Mhathuna infamously shouted “Get away, ye wife swapping sodomites” at journalists and Yes campaign members as the recount veered in the direction of a Yes vote.

swing in favour of divorce in areas such as Louth, that had voted no previously in 1986, contributed to the Yes victory. Other constituencies like Cork noted a swing in favour of divorce, however ultimately it did not pass the referendum. A significant factor in the second referendum was the increasingly unfavourable view of the Catholic Church in Irish society after the shocking child sex scandals that emerged in the early 1990s. An intervention by Pope John Paul II urging people to vote no was largely dismissed by those in favour of divorce. Some argued that if the Pope was sincere about addressing morals in Ireland, he should focus on the sexual abuse of children by priests instead. However other Catholic groups replaced the voice of the church, the Christian Centrist Party; the Children’s Protection Society; the Family Prayer Movement; Teachers Against the Amendment; the Committee of Lawyers against the Amendment. Smaller and less well funded, they nonetheless had some success in shaping the debate on the referendum. Charlie McCreevy speaking in the Dail in October 1995 warned against the confusing arguments used by the “No Divorce Campaign” led by former High court judge Rory O’Hanlon. Particularly the argument that the introduction of divorce would alter the status of every marriage in Ireland. “When the anti-divorce campaign spread confusion, it does it with slogans that have

little substance but carry a scary tune. It is like the minor key music which starts when the villain appears in a movie. It sets out to get a shiver going up the spine of the nation by telling the people that the minute divorce is on the Statute Book every marriage will become temporary and conditional…...That is pure fiction, comic book stuff”. McGreevy's warning would prove prophetic, a vigorous campaign peaked with another iconic moment. The antidivorce poster “Hello Divorce, Bye Bye Daddy” remains in the memory of political discourse almost 20 years later. This poster crystalised the popular argument that if divorce was legalised, Irish men would abandon their wives and families in droves. This however never came to pass as Ireland has the lowest rate of divorce in the European Union, at 0.6 per 1,000 inhabitants, according to Eurostat, the EU’s statistical arm. There was also a shift in the way Ireland was attempting to present itself as the 20th century ended. In the previous referendum prominent political figures opposed divorce. By 1995 all political parties were in favour. A new theme of tolerance and acceptance emerged amongst campaigners on the Yes side particularly in relation to Northern Ireland as John Bruton argued in a radio address: "The essence of the Catholic faith is particularly that it shows forgiveness. It would be very wrong not to allow our

law to express forgiveness to those whose consciences allow them to remarry. The case I'm making in regard to Northern Ireland is that we must have a way of governing that includes both communities, that includes the minority community. If we don't show tolerance for minorities here, we'll find it harder to argue for tolerance elsewhere. Is it the Ireland we like to present to the world as a place that has very strong beliefs but doesn't need to enforce them by law, that welcomes people with a different point of view and treats them well? Or an Ireland that's so afraid it has to use the criminal and civil law to enforce a particular set of beliefs?" Bruton’s speech is widely credited with giving the Yes victory a final push as a legal ruling prevented the spending of public money to promote only one side of the argument. This nearly upended the government campaign and political parties had to increase their efforts for a victory. The referendum ended with a turnout of 62.2% with 818,842 voting for the proposal and 809,728 against. A bitter and contentious campaign, the divorce referendum was a significant moment in Irish politics and history. The result however slight, was a significant moment in the separation of church and state and important in terms of the efforts towards a peace settlement in Northern Ireland where the influence of the Catholic Church on Irish society was feared.

Recent Advances in Climate Change Seana Davis investigates some of the latest advances to tackle climate change. Seana Davis Contributing Writer

HE CLOCK IS TICKING on how fast we can tackle climate change. The issue has become a stark reality. In a year overshadowed by politics, climate change is something that can simply no longer be ignored. As Mary Robinson, UN Special Envoy for Climate Change, said: “Climate change is a fundamental problem that we must solve and not merely pass on to the generations to come … We can’t let our children and grandchildren look back on this critical period in time and say that we failed them." The Paris Climate Change Agreement marked a significant moment in our history where more than 150 global leaders agreed to cut their countries carbon emissions. Scientists are continuously working on methods to tackle climate change. Some lesser known approaches seem rather unorthodox and intriguing: fossilized urine of a hyrax (known for urinating in the exact same spot for generations) and Narwhalmounted sensors to track Arctic water temperatures to name but a few approaches. SunTower: John C. Mankins is an innovative and successful scientist who spent 25 years working for NASA and CalTech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The physicist is a leader of space technology, who managed the 'Advanced Concepts Studies' at NASA for 10 years. There, he was creator and co-creator of many abstract innovations, one of which was the 'SunTower', a space solar power system. The aim of the project was to create solar panels in space that orbit the planet in low to middle latitudes, giving Earth limitless energy provided

by the sun. This method of creating terrestrial power was introduced in 1968 by Dr. Peter Glaser. The U.S government subsequently began its studies into alternative energies in the 1970's during the energy crisis. Today, with the improvement of modern technology and advancements in science, this concept may be swiftly turned into a reality. Mankins has since expanded upon this idea, publishing 'The Case for Solar Power’ in 2014, a summary of the history of the concept and also providing an outline of its future potential. Mankins details how launching a solar panel plant in space can be both cost-effective and doable - the initial start-up costs of the project could be as little as $10 million over the first two years, and costing a further $100 million over the next six years. He believes that the "first multi-megawatt pilot plant" will be in operation in the next 12 years, and that a pilot plant as large as the International Space Station (ISS) could be launched using current model launch technologies. However, the launch pads used would need to be more environmentally friendly than their current counterparts. The plant that Mankins has in mind would be far larger than any infrastructure orbiting Earth, including the ISS. The solar panel plant would consist of similar parts and would be far less complex to create than the 400 tonne International Space Station, the largest structure orbiting earth to date. However, one question must be asked: why has it taken so long to install orbiting solar panels? The answer primarily lies in the costs of the project. According to 'Discover' magazine, owing to the fact that the rockets are not reusable, it currently costs: “around $4,600 for each kilogram of payload lofted into low orbits." For the

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The plant that Mankins has in mind would be far larger than any infrastructure orbiting Earth, including the International Space Station

orbiting space solar panels to be economically viable, the cost would have to decrease to $400 per kilogram. Elon Musk, Canadian-American billionaire and inventor, created the company SpaceX with the goal of creating the technologies to reduce space transportation costs and enable the colonization of Mars. The company’s ‘reusable rocket’ - Falcon 9 - made headlines for all the wrong reasons when it exploded in Cape Canaveral on September 1st 2016. However, on 17 January 2017, the rocket put 10 satellites into orbit around the Earth and landed successfully on a drone ship in the Pacific Ocean off the Californian Coast. This represented a huge breakthrough for science, and reusable rockets should see a drop in cost with the advancement of such space technologies. Falcon 9 already has 4 return journeys booked for February this year. An assessment needs to be made as to how best to transmit energy using wireless power from Space to Earth in the most cost-effective and eco-friendly way possible. Wireless Transmitting Power was first conceived by Nicolas Tesla over 100 years ago. Serious advancements in this field have been made in the last 10 years. The first completely wireless LCD television was launched at the Consumer Electronics Show in 2010. Nowadays, you can buy wireless chargers in IKEA and can even charge your phone on a table in Starbucks. With such improvements in wireless technology, Dr Peter Glaser’s concept, birthed in 1968, seems less like science fiction. However, wireless charging only works for very small ranges at the moment. Wireless transmission technology will need to be improved for energy to be transmitted from space. The orbiting solar panels seem to be within technology's grasp, which could represent a

dramatic change in the future of renewable energy.

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Currently the United States is paving the way for carbon capture and possesses 16 of the total 22 capture plants worldwide

CO2 Capture and Sequestration: The idea of Carbon Capture stretches back to 1975 when researchers thought of a possible solution to our reliance on fossil fuels. They posed a question: What if we could capture CO2 emissions and bury them in the ground before they reached the atmosphere? Carbon Capture in power plants today occurs during three stages of production: before, during and after the burning of fossil fuels. Carbon dioxide is first separated from the other emitted gases and then absorbed into a solvent in order to capture it. The gas is then compressed to about 1500ppm in fluid form and transferred by pipelines or by ship to the site of sequestration, where it is buried underground. CO2 sequestration has become common practice within the oil industry for decades. In order to protect the local environment, oil and gas companies drill millions of tonnes of waste carbon dioxide into the ground annually. The companies drill about 800m into rocks with high porosity such as a sandstone, the CO2 is injected and absorbed into the pores of the rock which will then trap the gas for millions of years. In 1989, Carbon Capture and Sequestration Technologies Programme began in Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In 1991, Norway put a tax on carbon emissions. Following this, in 1998, a gas company in Norway began the Sleipner project, the first ever carbon capture and sequestration in commercial use. In 2000, Dakota Gasification Company (DGC), a coal burning plant, began its project to bury 96% of its CO2 waste in Weyburn, an oil field in Canada. In 2003, U.S President George

Bush announced the 'zero emissions' project, allocating research money to carbon capture and sequestration. Currently the United States is paving the way for carbon capture and possesses 16 of the total 22 capture plants worldwide. Though the U.K government has pledged £1 billion to the plants, as of yet, none are under construction and this is likely to be reassessed in the wake of Brexit. The companies adopting carbon capture and sequestration range from gas companies to some in the manufacturing industries. Carbon capture has yet to take off, however, and this is again, largely down to finance. It still remains much easier and cheaper to simply let the gas escape into the atmosphere rather than bury it. Norway, a world leader in green energy, has amassed much of its wealth on gas, and as such has been heavily invested in sequestration for many years. On the other hand, China, as the largest global polluter, is still focused on creating cheap energy. In 2011, a carbon capture and sequestration plant was built in Shanghai. Though this indicates a step in the right direction, in a year marked by whirlwind politics, investments in technologies such as this should not be put on the back burner. There is no mistaking or denying the severity of climate change due to human impact. Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere have increased by 40% since the industrial revolution (from 280 to 400 parts per million (ppm)), which will continue to rise with 70 million metric tonnes added to the atmosphere daily. Changes to our Earth are happening as you read this article, from melting ice caps to severe storms and droughts. The footprints we make today will certainly last for generations to come.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Features

Tory Island: a king in the North

The idea of a monarchy currently existing in Ireland might sound bizarre, but Sam Cox pays a visit to the people off the coast of Donegal who make it work Sam Cox

rings meld with a wise face and experienced hands to form a charming, if unconventional, air of royalty. Greeting every visitor individually, Patsy Dan is as much of the island as the whistling sea wind and briny air that welcomes you to Tory. Commanding respect and influence not through power, but kindness, talent and decency, his kingship is an integral part of the island. To many on the island, he has always been, and always will be, king.

Deputy features editor

F YOU ASKED A Tory Islander how far from the coast their home was, you would be met with an indignant glare, and be told it is in fact Ireland that lies fifteen kilometres from their island. Such is the mentality of those who inhabit Tory Island. With few residents, fewer jobs and a paltry handful of possible pastimes, those who live there have developed a unique way of life. With no reason to rise in the morning and even less reason to go to bed at night, the island itself emanates timelessness. What better way to spend a weekend? Home to some one hundred and forty people, Tory Island exists as a fairy-tale come to life in the Atlantic. Despite the minute number of inhabitants, the island's only settlement is divided into two halves: West Town and East Town. Composed of the same families for generations, these towns have passed down through time with little change or integration. With a traditional Gaelic-speaking population, and its own democratically-elected king, Tory embodies an Ireland lost in time. A Royal Welcome Curious to see the island for myself, my stay was no less removed from the norm. Received with the customary fáilte from King Patsy Dan, the village breathed stillness. We stayed at a local hostel for tourists, and met others who were staying on the island for varying lengths of time. All had been greeted by the king, and agreed everyone on Tory was more than accommodating. If nothing else, Tory has hospitality. The current monarch, Patsy Dan Rogers, is a painter and musician who has led the people of the island for years. Despite his age, his vitality still reverberates through his every action, and it is easy to see the artistic young man hidden within. Piercings and gold

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With a traditional Gaelic-speaking population, and its own democraticallyelected king, Tory embodies an Ireland lost in time

Exploring the Island After dropping our things at the hostel, we decided to explore and see what the island had to offer. Following the sounds of a good time, we travelled up to the hotel bar. Inside was a crowd of people, huddled around watching the match and cooking on the barbeque – closer to a gathering of friends than an afternoon at the pub. We were immediately invited to join in and have a pint. Those at the bar were happily watching the match, some already far into their (Second? Third? Sixth?) drink in the early afternoon. The social norms clearly weren’t the same as back home, but with everyone happy and friendly, who was complaining? Getting to Tory involves boarding a small ferry and travelling for forty minutes against the harsh waves. Shoved around by the sea, you get an understanding of why the inhabitants of the island rarely travel to and from the coast. The island community traditionally relied on fishing, supplemented by a small amount of farming. As the years have worn on, though, the islanders have found themselves unable to compete with the expanding numbers of European trawlers, and have switched to tourism to support themselves. Workplace of the English painter Derek Hill, the island has its own school of art, as well as a rich history that would justify it as a holiday destination to any tourist. Tory is more than that, however.

Talking to some locals in the hotel, we were told about a few of the must-sees on the island, as well as given directions to find our way around. On such a small island, none of these were too complicated, and we quickly had the lay of the land. Rather than stay for the match (GAA never held much appeal for me), we decided to go see the island for ourselves. Sheared by the sharp Atlantic wind and the relentless waves, Tory’s landscape has a minimalism reflected in its people. Tall cliff faces and barren rocky fields constitute the view from every window. The island isn’t characterised so much by what it has, but by what it lacks. No trees grow in its soil, lacking the strength to withstand the powerful oceanic gusts. No industry results in no employment, and with no capitalism to drive it, time ebbs away and loses its importance. Our reality seems to have abandoned Tory, and yet it remains steadfast among the waves, determined in its right to exist. After satisfying our curiosity, we arrived at the island clubhouse for the evening. There, we were met by a group of children sitting around another television. Watching the same match as their parents, they debated and discussed the players and situations. Their conversation, and their insights into the match, sounded twenty years older than the children themselves, and their maturity and passion shone through as they sat around the counter. Swigging from their pints of juice, it was hard not to smile. As the match ended, the adults (locals and tourists alike) from the pub came down and joined their kids, and a evening of dance, music and drink began. The Seasons Blurrily fumbling through the seasons, summers on Tory mean an influx of painters and the stillness that draws them. As the days darken however, Tory itself begins to shift. Winters consist of bleak, dreary days of separation. With storms from the Atlantic, the peace that makes the

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Our reality seems to have abandoned Tory, and yet it remains steadfast among the waves, determined in its right to exist

island a summer retreat quickly becomes a suffocating silence. For those who live there, it is an exercise in isolation and endurance. The worst of these times occurred in 1974, when a particularly bad storm engulfed the island, returning it after a long and harrowing eight weeks. By then, ten of the native families had made the decision to leave and not to return, slashing Tory’s already small numbers. Stories of Tory’s bizarre isolation go back centuries. One such tale frequently recounted to tourists tells of Tory fishermen washed up on the coast of Donegal in a storm in 1826. Ravaged by the waves, and drenched to the skin, locals reported half-conscious fishermen gathering leaves to stuff in their pockets. Temporarily escaping from their own land of myth to find something so foreign, the men were transfixed by these fallen green circles, the likes of which they had never seen before. Trees aren’t the only thing missing from Tory, either. With no guards on the island, the laws are loose, and almost

anything goes. Zooming past us on the road to the clubhouse was a child no older than twelve driving his parents’ car. Nor is there a curfew on selling drink, and so the party goes on long into the night. With live music as Gaeilge (except for Johnny Cash – we were told some things aren’t meant to be translated) and tourists and locals alike gathered around, there was no end of things to listen to and learn. While people are more than willing to talk to tourists as Bearla, the cúpla focal went a long way towards making a good impression. Regardless of the state of your Irish, however, the atmosphere was warm for anyone willing to sit and have a laugh. Over the next few days, we had a chance to see all Tory had to offer, and to take a breather from life outside. After passing the idle days reading and laughing with the locals, it was hard not to question our own way of living. Maybe we wouldn’t get rid of time completely, but there is definitely something to be said for Tory’s love of the moment.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Trinity Life

Fresh to the Cobblestones: TEDxTrinity Society We speak to the freshest society to hit Trinity this year on the TED Talks phenomenon, the society’s formation and who we can expect to see at their upcoming talks. Elle Loughran

at a time, which keeps the audience’s attention. Throughout a half-day conference, the talks would cover all disciplines, as well as promote local ideas rather than famous speakers, something that stood out from other societies we thought.

Contributing Writer TED is a growing cultural phenomenon, with their combined video views having passed the 1 billion mark in 2012. With their mission of sharing “ideas worth spreading” in talks shorter than 18 minutes, TED seem to have struck gold. TEDx events are independently organised and allow the successful TED format to be spread to local events and speakers. Now, almost four years after TEDxUCD and TEDxDCU launched, TEDxTrinity Society is bringing the event to us. I interviewed TEDxTrinity’s PRO, Cornelia Lillis, about why the society was established and their plans for the future. How did you get interested in TEDx talks? What appeals to you about the format?

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We would like to prioritise local speakers from the community to showcase their innovative ideas which otherwise wouldn’t be heard.

Most people our age are aware of TED talks through the internet. But when we realised that there was no TEDx society in the university, we started to look into it a bit more. We like that the talks are short, limited to 18 minutes

What led you to found the TEDxTrinity society? We noticed the fact that Trinity doesn’t have a TEDx society to its name, even though other universities such as UCD and DCU do. Many students have shown enthusiasm for the society throughout the process of setting it up, showing that there’s a large demand. With Trinity’s reputation, we felt this would also draw speakers and guests to the events. Have you got a TEDx license? How was your experience of that process? Yes, as the license was obligatory before we could apply for society status. We began the process at the beginning of Hilary Term last year, therefore it was quite a lengthy process. We had to write an application demonstrating our motivation and vision for the event to TED, detailing our theme and

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TEDx events are independently organised and allow the successful TED format to be spread to local events and speakers.

potential speakers. Can you explain the theme of the inaugural TEDxTCD and how you settled on that theme? Our theme is “Place your bets”, which is centred around the topic of decision making, from personal life choices, to policies with a global impact. We thought this would be applicable to many disciplines, ranging from Psychology to Mathematics, Politics to Art, Economics to Biology.

Who is eligible to speak at TEDxTCD? Is there anything you'd like potential speakers to know? We would like to prioritise local speakers from the community to showcase their innovative ideas which otherwise wouldn’t be heard. There are no restrictions for who is eligible. We’d like to hold a competition offering the opportunity for a student to speak at the event.

Anybody with an inspiring story or idea to share is more than welcome to put themselves forward, so long as they are not promoting a certain political or controversial agenda. If you were to give a TED talk, what would it be on and why? If we were to give a TED talk, we’d give a talk on ‘How to Deal with Writer’s Block’, because we couldn’t think of a better answer to this question.

Magnified Societies Sizing Up SUAS: The Guys Behind the Green Trinity Life sits down with the president of SUAS to find out about the many worthwhile opportunities provided by one of Trinity’s most prominent volunteering societies.

Laura Grant Staff Writer

E HAVE ALL SEEN the green tshirts out in force around campus during Freshers’ Week. We stopped to look at the pop-up exhibitions from the 8x8 Festival in October, and our Facebook feeds feature students who’ve set up a GoFundMe page to raise money before they head off to India for ten weeks. However, I wanted to get to the core of SUAS, one of Trinity’s fastest rising societies, and find out what they’re actually all about about. Growth in Recent Years From chatting to TCD SUAS President Kevin Keane, I discovered that since being founded in 2004 by a group of Trinity students, SUAS has now become one of the biggest volunteering societies in College. When I think of SUAS, volunteering immediately springs to mind, but recently they've also moved into activism. In the past few years they've flourished as a society, growing from a mere 50 members four years ago, up to their 900 members today. They’ve continued with their overseas volunteering programme but have made the addition of domestic programmes which take place in Dublin City, including their paired literacy programme and SUAS Ar Scoil. You can sign up to these programmes as a way to get involved on a local scale and contribute towards helping educate young people on topics such as global warming and feminism, opening up their minds that little bit more to the intricacies of the world around them. You cannot help but get the overall feeling that those in

SUAS genuinely care about the people they work with, and speaking to Kevin gave me an insight into the impact of the work they carry out. Their primary message is one of empowerment, with their main ethos focused on a dedication to combating social issues through volunteering and activism. Avoiding Voluntourism SUAS feel strongly about not wishing to send their volunteers on a ‘voluntourism’ programme. The volunteering opportunity in India is one centred around a goal of helping children from underprivileged backgrounds gain an education. On their return to Ireland, the hope is that, feeling newly empowered and inspired, volunteers will continue a conversation. The ten week programme, arguably the cornerstone of the society, may be daunting to some considering you’re thousands of miles away from home without the many daily comforts that we often take for granted, but it is clear from talking to Kevin that such time is necessary and worth the rewards. The importance of ten weeks worth of quality volunteering became evident as Kevin told me about the abandonment issues the children face in their society - to volunteer for only three weeks, forming a bond only to turn and leave again, now seems borderline cruel the more I think about it. He shared a touching story of one of his pupils, who, within the final month, he discovered was due to get married before the year was out. Her parents could not afford to keep her in the school until she was 17 years old, and so an arranged marriage was the only alternative to continuing her education any further. The harsh reality of

life in a place where human rights leave much to be desired is something that is only too easy to forget when you’re in the friendly classroom environment. SUAS volunteers seek to bring a bit of light into those situations where children are forced to grow up at an accelerated rate. SUAS don’t try to mould student volunteers into teachers overnight, nor do they give them tasks too demanding for their capabilities. Rather than throwing a history student into a classroom to teach children mathematics, they form partnerships with schools and teachers and support them with their work. Unsurprisingly, it’s worked pretty well over the past few years, with groups of students continuing to head out every summer to volunteer. Starting a Conversation The conversation that they want to continue at home has also found itself continuing successfully in the format of STAND, the quarterly magazine that gives students a platform through which they can express themselves on topics they feel passionate about; from the refugee crisis to environmental sustainability, anyone with a voice can become involved. To those who may be a little shy about voicing their opinion in person, STAND seems like the perfect way to present your viewpoint on issues relating to global development. The ethos of SUAS is clear, because the majority of what they do is based around it, around reaching out to the average student, educating them on global issues and encouraging them to get involved in a low-pressure environment. It all sounds rather promising to me.

On the decks with DUDJ

In an interview with Rob Fitzpatrick, Chair of DUDJ, he discusses the perks of being a member, the rise of techno music and the perseverance required to be a successful DJ Maeve Harris Contributing Writer

OR THOSE OF US not in the know, who are DUDJ, what exactly do they do, and how can you get involved? I spoke with the society’s chairperson, Rob Fitzpatrick, in an attempt to answer these essential questions and ultimately get the inside scoop on DUDJ. Speaking about how he first became involved with the society, Fitzpatrick shared that he “took an interest in [DUDJ] four years ago. When I was in first year they were doing Surf, Sail, Salmon with the Fishing Soc”. Originally known as the Digital Arts Society, they later changed their name to the DUDJ we know today. For a society centred around such a specific interest, DUDJ have gathered a notable following, as Fitzpatrick revealed: “We have around 200 members, which has been growing year after year. When I first started, we had 110 members.” DUDJ are much more than a strictly musicoriented society, according to Fitzpatrick: “It’s a lot more than DJing,” he noted. “For instance, I've gotten loads of experience in planning events [through the society]. We've done lots of events with DU Snowsports in recent years, with Snow & Spin taking place last Freshers’ Week and then House of Hatters this year. We plan what equipment we need. We had live rappers for House of Hatters, so [we] had to do soundchecks with them. [We are] coming up with new ideas to make events that are unique and fresh that are actually fun for people.” On the society’s greatest successes, Fitzpatrick mentioned the role they played in Wind, Wave, Rave this year along with the Sailing Society, Surf Society, and Windsurfing Society. “We essentially had to fund the

whole thing ourselves which meant organising a dance tent with speakers, lights, et cetera as well as transporting students to the other side of Ireland. It's a lot of fun and very rewarding.” Joining DUDJ has many benefits whereby you’ll likely end up attending a variety of events, allowing you to experience a side of society life that you may not have otherwise been involved in, and often for free. “I often joke to people saying I joined every society without spending a penny,” Fitzpatrick highlighted. “Getting involved with DUDJ has let me see so much more of College than I thought I would. I've also been lucky enough to play at many events.” Fitzpatrick argued that as a society, DUDJ are “kind of a mini Ents society where we get to do more niche [events]. We aim to do tutorials and teach people to DJ/produce, and then showcase their talents at events”. In doing so, they provide a fantastic opportunity to those who may wish to pursue music as a potential occupation. The increasing popularity of DJ nights has seen DUDJ members go on to run club nights such as Zodiac and Malibu. On the question of whether it’s becoming easier to break into DJing, Fitzpatrick is opposed: “I think it’s harder than ever to be a DJ. If you don't keep practicing and tune hunting, you'll be left behind.” Being a part of a society like DUDJ can help you become part of a community that may offer you a platform to break into the profession. Fitzpatrick also believes that although DJ nights have become more popular, “the scene won't ever die, [it’s] just inflated at the moment”. Clubs in Dublin have been reasonable in offering chances to young DJs according to Fitzpatrick, though it's up

to the DJ to work hard and push to get exposure. “Really it's just about wanting to get your name out there. If you mix regularly and make the effort, your chance will come.” DUDJ has been supported in their ventures by “big name companies such as Bedlam [and] Abstract & Sense”, companies that have influence on the nightlife scene in Dublin which in turn contributes to the society's ability to provide a platform to young DJs in developing their talents. On the topic of prominent artists on the scene at the moment, Fitzpatrick emphasised that your favourite artists can be important in influencing your style and for making playlists

for the best nights out. “Certainly one of my favorite DJs and producers is Claude Von Stroke, his music got me into the whole DJing thing. Jamie XX is a big mention; the man makes some serious tunes.” Make sure to keep your eyes peeled for more events hosted by the ever-growing DUDJ. For those of us eager to explore the world of djing, they are hosting an event at The Sugar Club on Thursday, January 26th at 11PM featuring some of DUDJ’s most notable members, as well as Chali 2na of Jurassic 5, for an event in collaboration with Choice Cuts. Alternatively, you can check out their Soundcloud, or simply visit their society’s room in House 6.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Trinity Life

Views from House 6

With Rainbow Week upon us, Hugh Whelan caught up with the current LGBTQ Rights Officer, Sean O’ Carroll, to discuss his role within the Students’ Union. Rainbow Week, Pink Day, and so on.” As SU LGBTQ Rights Officer, what are some of the most common queries you deal with in your role?

Hugh Whelan Staff Writer

EAN O’ CARROLL IS A 3rd Year computer science student, and this year’s’ SU LGBTQ Rights Officer. He explained to me that, in essence, his role entails being in charge of “representing the LGBTQ communities’ interests in Students’ Union decisions, and making sure the LGBTQ community are made visible on campus through running various campaigns such as

Well, I often get emails in relation to casework – whether that’s issues with academic registry, or welfare issues. A frequent example is name changes - situations arise where lecturers and/ or teaching assistants don’t respect gender pronouns or preferred names. At that point, I act as a liaison and attempt to rectify things. Q: You had a recent success in SU Council with a motion passed in favour of more gender-neutral bathrooms being made available around campus and also at SU events. What progress would you like to see beyond this in the future?

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One thing I would certainly like to see [is] the provision of sanitary facilities in both men’s and women’s toilets, and ideally, having free sanitary products available for all on campus.

One thing I would certainly like to see [is] the provision of sanitary facilities in both men’s and women’s toilets, and

ideally, having free sanitary products available for all on campus. What are some practical tips for students who may be interested in getting involved in the area of LGBTQ Rights in College? The various campaigns we run are a great place to start. We have Rainbow Week taking place at the moment, followed by our “I am, I exist” and the campaign in favour of PREP HIV Medication coming up later this year. Another simple thing that students can do if they can’t get time to help with the campaigns is just to read around on the subject, and raise their own awareness

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LGBTQ Community?

positions?

What specifically will be happening for Rainbow Week? This year’s theme is “Queer and…”. It’s about celebrating the diversity in Trinity’s queer community. There will be a whole range of events throughout the week including Q&A panels, mocktail receptions, LipSync – and we’re collaborating with societies like VisArts to make badges, Cumman Gaelach for the famous “Gaeyly”, the Hist, Q Soc, and so on.

Importantly, the gender recognition act, while an important document, needs to be improved – for example, trans persons under 18 aren’t currently recognised within it, which needs to be rectified. HIV also is rising amongst Irish gay men, and this is due to government inaction – they have stalled on the introduction of the HIV medication PREP, which is proven to tackle HIV effectively and could dramatically improve things here.

Well in first year, I actually wasn’t directly involved in the SU, although I was very interested in it… it wasn’t until second year that I applied and successfully got onto the welfare committee. I had a great experience with Body and Soul Week and so on, and had always been interested in LGBTQ issues, so I went for it and here I am now!

What progress would you like to see nationally in relation to achieving more for the

How did you come to be in the role that you’re in, for all those interested in SU

If someone had an LGBTQ Rights related issue, how could they contact you? The best is way is through my email at lgbt@tcdsu.org, or else just send a facebook message!

A letter to You

College can fly by, so it’s important to take time to enjoy some of the things that you might miss when you step out of front arch for the last time. take shape in ways that would never have been possible without the insight you’ve accumulated as a student.

Stephen Carty Contributing Writer

Secondly, I strongly urge you to take full advantage of your surroundings whilst here at Trinity. Our campus provides us with some incredible facilities, with a copyright library system, internationally-renowned academics, and a great gym to name but a few. The fact that it’s located right in the city center is not something to be overlooked either, with numerous restaurants, coffee shops, and cultural attractions lying right outside our very doorstep.

HEN I WAS FIRST told that college flies by, as most students are, I didn’t quite believe it. Beginning my time at Trinity in September 2013, I assumed college would take its sweet time and I would be able to try a lot of new things before graduating. As it turns out, only half of that proved to be true. I certainly did get to experience lots of new things, but I did not expect my time here to go by quite so quickly. Heading into my last semester of college is a reality I never thought would truly hit. And now, in just four short months, I will be walking out of the RDS for what I hope to be the last time. As my student experience here draws to a close, I cannot help but reminisce about the lasting memories I’ve made these past four years. From my initial experience in Halls during my Freshman years, to my time spent with Trinity FM and GAA, I’ve realised that your time in College is not something that can ever be replaced. Living as an undergraduate student provides a window for you to learn a lot about yourself and truly grow as a person. If you were to ask if I have changed much in four years, my answer would be yes, absolutely. Granted, my goals have mostly stayed the same throughout college, but my personality has developed and transformed. Ultimately, I’ve learned a lot about who I am as a person. This is a time for you to become the person you want to be, hopefully a person others may grow to admire. With this is mind, I have some final thoughts to impart.. Firstly, the knowledge you have acquired here will stand to you, serving you well as you embark upon any and all future endeavors. Most of us came to Trinity College with an enthusiasm to learn, to seek out knowledge and ultimately gain a better understanding of the fields we chose to study and indeed much more beyond that. The knowledge you have accumulated in your years in college will stick with you, benefiting you in ways you may not always be immediately aware of. All that you have learned, which is perhaps more than you think, might I add, will serve to guide you as you move forward. What may initially feel daunting and aimless will

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"They [TAP students] have made a real contribution to the social and cultural environment of Trinity."

As time goes by we tend to take this for granted, shuttling out of the Arts Block at 6pm each evening with a blinkered view to all that surrounds us. If you can set aside the time, I recommend walking the distance of the rugby pitch every once in a while. Regardless of how you decide to go about it, find a way to appreciate your favourite aspects of Trinity while you still can, and really relish in them, enjoying the simplicity of the quieter moments. Rather than wishing time away, take your semester one day at a time. Afford yourself the opportunity to savour the simplicity of some of the smaller, but equally endearing things about Trinity. Finally, if the best way to predict the future is to create it, how we spend our time at Trinity has the potential to mold our prospective futures in more ways than one. For all of us soon-to-be college graduates, our future is now somewhat dependent on our academic performance in these final few months and it can be a struggle to prevent this fact from consuming us. Make optimum use of Trinity’s resources, whether for the first or final time, and graduate in the comfort of knowing that whatever your grade, you performed to the best of your abilities. You’ve come so far and to give up now would be a disservice to nobody but yourself. If it doesn’t work out the way you wanted, don’t be too hard on yourself. If there’s one thing I can say about how I feel walking away from Trinity, it’s that College leaves you better equipped to deal with whatever life may throw at you, and the time has come to make use of our newfound skills. Essentially, whatever happens, we can and will all find our way.

Tapping into the Trinity Access Programme Deputy Life Editor Megan Thompson discusses the success of the Trinity Access Programmes with TAP advisor, Katriona O'Sullivan as well as the programme’s future plans for expansion. Megan Thompson Deputy Trinity Life Editor

N APRIL 2016, THE Trinity Access Programmes (TAP) organised a “privilege walk” to highlight the diversity within Trinity, and to raise awareness of who they are and what exactly they are trying to achieve. The primary aim of TAP is to make college a reality for those who feel excluded from that narrative and yet strongly wish to have a college experience. TAP advisor Katriona O'Sullivan, who looks after the research and impact of TAP and Trinity Access 21, said that this diversity is one of the benefits that TAP brings to Trinity. TAP is there not only to bring diversity the student population, but to “break that barrier between a person's life situation and talent”. In 1993, TAP was formed as part of Trinity’s plan to encourage those who come from lower socio-economic groups and who are underrepresented in higher education to go to university. Since its formation, TAP has gone on to become linked to 19 primary and 20 secondary schools around Dublin. They make regular visits to these schools, where TAP students talk about their own experiences. Through the publicization of these personal stories, the hope is to encourage students to go on to study at college level. The Programmes TAP runs two foundation courses for Higher Education for Young Adults, one located in Trinity, the other in the Liberties. These are year-long courses during which students of TAP must complete assignments and sit exams. Depending on their level of success, students may earn the opportunity to begin their studies in Trinity. This progression route is ideal for students who are unsure of

what they would like to do following their time at school, and also for those who have a passion for learning but due to certain circumstances find themselves unable to achieve the CAO points necessary for their desired course. Success Stories TAP is not only for those fresh from leaving school. They also have a foundation course for Higher Education for Mature Students. As their students enter Trinity, TAP continues to support them, and offers a wide range of supports for those who are part of the programme, such as writing resources, a maths centre, and financial support. These supports are there to help students achieve their maximum potential in College, and to help lessen some of the burdens that come with college life. When speaking about the academic success of those in the programme, O'Sullivan revealed that TAP students have a 94% course completion rate, and typically perform just as well as those who enter college through the Leaving Cert. O'Sullivan reflected on the original scepticism the programme faced, and how the talent of TAP students has gone on to wash away this scepticism, allowing TAP to be embraced and to grow. “We are forming an army of successful students”, O’Sullivan commented, with some of TAP’s most prominent success stories including Senator Lynn Ruane and Laura Ann Lambert – the first student of TAP to become a surgeon. Understandably, these success stories have increased TAP’s popularity, and serve to encourage the programme in its bid to accommodate and give equal opportunity to those with the passion and determination to progress in their academic career. The Future of TAP Asked about the future of TAP, O'Sullivan expressed

her excitement. The positive impact of TAP has spread outside Ireland, laying the groundwork for Oxford University to set up their own access programme based on TAP. O'Sullivan revealed that TAP are hoping to develop this international relationship, and that students from the Oxford programme have been invited to Trinity to strengthen the relationship.

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"They [TAP students] have made a real contribution to the social and cultural environment of Trinity."

O'Sullivan also talked about Trinity Access 21, which was formed in 2014 as a programme between TAP, Bridge21, the School of Computer Science & Statistics, and the School of Education. Trinity Access 21 is a mentoring programme in secondary schools that aims to support and encourage students to reach their full educational potential through innovation, research and advocacy. Through the success of this programme over its initial three years, O'Sullivan has no doubt that it will help spread the message of the TAP programme into all communities. She revealed that the Shamrock Rovers, TAP and Trinity Sports are coming together, with the support of Equality Fund, to form a link between TAP, education and sports. The programme will be called “College for Every Student”, and will seek to combine elite soccer training and education: “It's for students from DEIS schools who think they have to choose soccer or education; this aims to combine both”. Trinity College continues to support the growth of TAP, with the provost, Patrick Prendergast, remarking in The Irish Times on the success and impact of TAP and recognizing the programme's achievements: “Their degree outcomes have been impressive and they have made a real contribution to the social and cultural environment of Trinity”.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Trinity Life

The survival tale of a Schols candidate The challenges of sitting Schols exams and the madness that can ensue are discussed by MSISS student Devin Connolly, as he dissects his recent experience. Devin Connolly Contributing Writer

RINITY COLLEGE’S E L E C T I N G OF Foundation Scholars is a longestablished tradition, and the term “Schols”, derived from “scholarship”, has over the years come to mean much more than simply an imbursement or an award based on excellence. It is a set of exams, a period in time, a mindset and a journey simultaneously: an endeavour either painfully forgotten or forever relished. It is that nine hours of frantic scribbling in the eerie Exam Hall in early January. It is that three-month period when studying consumes you and it becomes a struggle to divert your thoughts anywhere else. It is that mindset that you brought this upon yourself and so have nobody to blame but yourself, coupled with fleeting moments of clarity. You start to think you may actually be up for this challenge, but just moments later it dawns on you that you are in fact hopeless and should never have taken on this demanding trial to begin with. The mindset Fundamentally, it is a challenge, and everyone approaches challenges differently. You have the quietly confident, the openly arrogant, the visibly distraught, and those that have become so indifferent to the whole process that they regard it all with a shrug and a blank stare. Some like to complain, though when you realise that it is a personal choice to take on this challenge, those complaints seem almost childish. Then we decide that, rather than complain about the exams, we will complain about ourselves, or about anything else. “Why did I choose to do this to myself?” is a phrase heard all too often. In choosing to embrace the challenge to begin with,

you start to brand yourself as an expected achiever of academic excellence, a step above your peers, and you begin to wonder how you will be judged if, in the statistically more likely case, you are not awarded a scholarship. Personally, I disagree with this mentality. There is no shame in challenging and pushing yourself in order to see what you can achieve if you truly apply yourself. But then it dawns on you: if you fail to achieve that fabled distinction, the whole thing becomes a waste of time and you should probably have never chosen to embark on the journey in the first place. It is a long, drawn-out and draining process, and one that tends to provoke some rather outlandish behaviour from the majority of candidates, myself included. By January, I knew the driver of the first bus (6am) personally and had a self-declared seat in both the 24-hour and the Hamilton, where I was almost moved to tears if my seat was taken; eventually, my friends began to ask when I was formally moving into the library. It became pointless to ask what my plans were during this break or after that lecture. My parents undoubtedly began to question my sanity as I was pushed from standard good and bad days to the more extreme ends of the emotional spectrum. For all intents and purposes, there were days where you could say I “lost the plot” – but I suppose that’s all part of the process. Advice Looking back, my own advice, whatever it might be worth, is this: don’t be afraid to take breaks. One night out or half a day disconnected from the daily grind can work wonders, and time can be made up in the long run. Secondly, work together. Having someone to discuss things with and compare answers with is beneficial, but most importantly it allows you to pace yourself, and even a small bit of competition can improve your productivity immensely. Confidence, in my

case, deserted me nearly as often as it graced me with its presence.

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“There were days where you could say I lost the plot”

Some days you might be cheery and feel ready for anything, and the next you’ll want nothing but to quit and be finished with it all. Take a breath, take a short break, and get back to it. I always found getting back into it with something you find straightforward or more enjoyable speeds up the process. Luck is definitely a factor. There are many extremely talented and intelligent people who simply won’t get what they might deserve, not just with regard to Schols but to life in general. Do all that you can to prepare, but that includes preparing to not succeed. If it was easy, everyone would do it. It’s tough, and you just have to be tougher.

You may endure your most painful Christmas to date, but once you decide to take the challenge on, also take it upon yourself to see it through. It is incredibly easy to recede into the mindset that everyone is against you, and there is nobody willing you to succeed except yourself. Questions are unfair, timetables are a disgrace, Trinity wants to hand out as few scholarships as possible, your bus or train misses you on purpose, your seemingly insignificant parttime job decide they are now the most important thing in your life or your landlord seems to understand you are stressed and decides to pile on the extra pressure. False, false, false, false and false. The smallest issues seem exaggerated, that is true, but nobody is actively willing you to not succeed. In the case of this year’s exams, for example,

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“Some days you might be cheery and feel ready for anything, and the next you’ll want nothing but to quit and be finished with it all.”

I know of numerous issues ranging from typos in papers to miscommunications in the curriculum and timetabling issues. All of these were resolved adequately, with the students in mind. The struggle is understood, and the majority are on your side, which is always helpful to remember. It is a cliché, of course, but we do know how it feels. Sitting the Schols exams could be a colossal waste of time, or it could an enlightening experience where you discover much about yourself, how you work best and how well you cope with continued duress and mental fatigue. In all honesty, the only way to find out is to try, and even if it backfires horribly you can at least say you had the courage to test yourself.

Scholarships, Classics and The Phil: Oscar Wilde at Trinity Trinity has had many notable alumni pass through its grounds, but who were they when they were students and what did they actually get up to? In the case of Oscar Wilde, these are some of the questions Mary Hartnett sought to answer.

Mary Hartnett Staff Writer

INCE IT WAS FOUNDED in 1592, Trinity College has seen its fair share of notable individuals pass through Front Arch. As students, they roamed the corridors of the Museum Building, climbed the stairs of the GMB and practiced their shot on the Cricket pitch. As alumni, they have gone on to make great contributions both within Irish society and on international academic and cultural level. Trinity’s most famous alumni range from the likes of Samuel Beckett and Jonathan Swift, to Michael O’Leary and David McWilliams. One of the most recognised and influential of these alumni is the great playwright, novelist and poet, Oscar Wilde. Born to successful AngloIrish Dublin intellectuals at 21 Westland Row in 1854, Wilde’s childhood was, much like his parents, unconventional. His mother, Jane Francesca Elgee, considered herself somewhat of a revolutionary, as well as being an artist and writer. His father, Sir William Wilde, was an eminent Victorian and an aural doctor, with there also being whispers of him being an alcoholic. The Wilde children were often left to mingle with the intellectuals, artists and internationally-known medics who passed through their doors. Being exposed to many of the highly educated elite would have provided a strong

foundation to Wilde’s path to Trinity College. Wilde benefited the many advantages of superior education at Portora Royal School in Enniskillen, Co. Fermanagh. Here saw the genesis of his passion for Classics come into being, a subject he would later go on to study at Trinity. He won several prizes during his time at Portora and graduated with a royal scholarship to attend Trinity College Dublin. During September 1871, Wilde began his four year stint in Trinity College. At the time, Trinity was a world leader in the field of Classics, a fact that appealed to Wilde given his aptitude for this area. In his time there, he would encounter other scholars such as R. Y. Tyrell, Arthur Palmer and Edward Dowden. Wilde’s time at Trinity also connected him with his tutor, J.P Mahaffy, who inspired Wilde’s love of Greek. This was one of the most influential relationships formed by Wilde during this time. As an undergraduate, Mahaffy became President of the University Philosophical Society, otherwise known as The Phil, and later went on to become Provost of the College. Conversations between Wilde and Mahaffy are said to have been colourful, with the two often discussing topics such as homosexuality in Ancient Greece. Wilde was arguably a protégée of Mahaffy, describing him as his “first and greatest teacher”. The two also worked together on Mahaffy’s book, Social Life in Greece, with Wilde crediting him as

“the scholar who showed me how to love Greek things”. Mahaffy himself boasted of having “created” Wilde.

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Wilde was a seemingly rebellious character in a way that only Wilde could be, getting himself into trouble one year for turning up to College three weeks after the term had begun.

The Phil played a significant role in Wilde’s time at Trinity, providing him with an educational resource as well as a social outlet. He quickly became an established member, discussing both intellectual and artistic subjects on a weekly basis, such as the work of Rossetti and Swinburne. It was here that he presented one of his first papers, entitled Aesthetic Morality. The more lighthearted and witty side of Wilde’s personality can also be seen in his interaction with this society, with the members' suggestion book for 1874 containing two pages which sportingly mock his emergent aestheticism. However, Wilde’s involvement in Trinity went far beyond his relationship with Mahaffy and his involvement with The Phil. He was awarded many honours during his time, including the Berkeley Gold Medal, the University's highest academic award in Greek. He also came top of the class in his first year, and after sitting the Foundation Scholarship Examinations in his second year, was successfully awarded the title of a scholar. Despite his apparent intellect and talent, Wilde was a seemingly rebellious character in a way that only he could be, getting himself into trouble one year for turning up to College three weeks after the term had begun,

though he continued to prove himself as an excellent scholar. His success within Trinity’s community lead to the eventual attraction of public attention through the distinctive nature of his writing and opinions, garnering him fame and recognition throughout Dublin City. As his four years at Trinity drew to a close, Wilde wished to continue his studies of Classics and Greek. Encouraged by his peers and teachers at Trinity to compete for a demyship (a type of scholarship) to Magdalen College, Oxford, he was unsurprisingly successful

in procuring this; such was the extent of his talent for these subjects. He went on to study at the College from 1874 until 1878. Wilde’s legacy in Trinity does not end with the time he spent studying there. Eager to preserve the connection with renowned alumnus, College set up the Trinity Oscar Wilde Centre for Irish Writing in January 1998. The centre resides at Wilde’s birthplace and familial home at 21 Westland Row. According to the centre’s webpage, “as an interface between the College and the

community, the Oscar Wilde Centre plays a role in bringing the achievement and ambition of writers and scholars to the attention of a wider public both at home and abroad.” They offer multiple courses in both creative and Irish writing, as well as running a series of evening lectures open to the public. In February of 2011, an Oscar Wilde Festival organised by DU Players and The Phil was held on campus, showcasing comedy, music, theatre and spectacle set in Wilde's old stamping ground, with Trinity’s campus coming alive to pay tribute to one of its most renowned alumni.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Trinity Life

Going against the grain: student-run club nights With the continuous rise of club nights set up by students seeking to bring something different to the scene, Alice Whelan speaks to some of those involved on what is involved and why they think it’s worth the risk. Alice Whelan Deputy Trinity Life Editor

TUDENT-RUN CLUB NIGHTS are a particular favourite of Trinity students, with nights both run by and targeted at Trinity students packing big venues to their capacity. It is not easy to gather this kind of support and successfully an independent club night, but student-run events such as BoraBora, the Midnight Disco and Wrekt have garnered huge support not only from the base of Trinity students the teams draw from, but equally for becoming recognised in their own right as distinctive club night experiences for those outside College. These nights can offer students a taste of something different, with the added entertainment of seeing your peers behind the decks. The entrepreneurs behind these nights have tapped into gap on the scene for nights entirely different to the homogenous Harcourt experience, and the evident demand for live DJ sets provided by music students. Deep house and techno nights have really come to the fore and student-run club nights are able to provide for this trend. Starting a club night is, in many ways, both a business venture and an outlet for the passion some students possess for music. It can be rewarding

on both these fronts. For students wishing to kickstart their own events, there is a lucrative market due to the increasing popularity of house and techno nights, or ‘alternative’ nights, and the lack of offerings to fill that vacuum. Trisha Cusack, a SF BESS student in Trinity, is one of six behind the creation of the new and much talked about night, the Midnight Disco, which has sold out every night it has run since its inception in October of Michaelmas term. Cusack believes part of the appeal of these nights is that “it's run by students, aimed at students. We're not some company like Nightlife who own every club in town - we're just six second year students who wanted to put on a good night for our friends, and people appreciate that.” It is no mean feat to plan and run a night that students will show a genuine interest in, and requires a keen business sense. The teams behind these events must put huge amount of thought into the branding of the night and creating its unique feel. Careful planning has to go into the orchestration of promoting the event. Students are notoriously hard to please and would be wary of the unpredictable quality of nights in Dublin. Getting a ‘crowd’ to attend that will enjoy the night's offerings demands the creation of a strong brand. Cusack argues that “to set up your own club night, it's necessary to have

a vision and know what you want from your club night. [For] us at the Midnight Disco, [we] wanted to emphasise the progression of light to dark with the music that we play (the transition from disco to house and eventually to techno). If you don't know what you want to happen with your night, then it won't go anywhere.”

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We're just six second year students who wanted to put on a good night for our friends

Jonah Craig, Trinity JS Computer Science and Business student and the sole candidate for the role of SU Ents Officer this year, was one of a group of four to start the club night BoraBora, which runs interchangeably between clubs such as Hangar, Søder and Ko, Opium Rooms and the Button Factory. Craig explains, based on his own experience, “[that] in any business, the hardest part of establishing a successful club night is the launch period. It requires much thought of what your brand is and what group of students you are marketing it towards. Creating a strong brand image is essential.” Students are uniquely placed to understand how to cater to the needs of fellow students and how to maximise social media in promotion efforts. Students are hired as reps by clubs precisely for these reasons. The club nights that survive the initial launch period will need to maintain the hype on social media and work consistently to develop the night’s brand.

Techniques to do this could involve collaborating with other events, for instance the Midnight Disco ran alongside Hangar’s Techno and Cans last weekend. Collaboration was also important in the development of BoraBora, Craig explained: “Just after the inception of BoraBora, we ran a collaborative event with another club night where we brought international act BAKERMAT to Dublin.” For Craig, entrepreneurial skills are also key, as well as creative vision. “In terms of being entrepreneurial when running a club night, I have found that you need to be adventurous - be willing to experiment with new ideas and to think outside the box when establishing a club night. Doing little things like creating a funny, wellread event description goes a long way too!’” Similarly for Cusack, the fact that students are using their own finances to kickstart their nights adds risks: “Being entrepreneurial definitely helps because at the end of the day it's our own money that we are investing into the night and you need to be savvy about how you spend it.”

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You need to be adventurous - be willing to experiment with new ideas and to think outside the box

The commercial side of these events is important, but what really shines through as an attendee of these events is the passion of the students for their craft. The quality of the DJing is exceptionally high and comes at a cheaper price than the non-student nights currently saturating

the market. Secondly, it's a chance to be sure of seeing students from your own year at the event as well as running it, providing an ideal setting in which to socialise outside of campus. It makes for a notable change from the Harcourt experience but also from a lot of students experiences at home, as Cusack suggests: “These club nights are something you'd never find back home.” For many students, the Dublin “scene” is a radical change from that of home, and can be a privileged chance to listen and play music you’re not normally in a position to. Given the remarkable success of these nights as of late, student-run club nights will definitely continue to appeal to the student population. There is little reason why a group of students with the right vision and business sense cannot hope to be successful. However, not all nights have managed to maintain regular crowds. This may be because, although there is a market there, it is proving increasingly difficult to find appropriate spaces to host such nights as many clubs which have traditionally hosted such nights have shut down in recent years. Students will have to be particularly driven to gain exposure for their music and work hard to maintain the traction of their ventures if they are to stand the test of time.

Take two: mastering Hilary Term

Having carefully deciphered your mam’s exasperated comments on college existence, we’ve come up with the essential advice you need to survive your second semester at Trinity. Sarah Donnelly Contributing Writer Mam says “GO TO YOUR EFFING LECTURES” Meaning: Go to your lectures this Hilary Term. Yes, you’re starting to grow lethargic and you’re tired of being told what to do but here’s the thing; you don’t have to go to all of them. Even one of them will do, just so you remember you have that module. This advice is both for myself and those like me who find themselves caught up in a chill lunch that just happened to run two hours over what you planned because you were discussing your mate’s friend’s mates’ love life, and that lecture couldn’t be that important, right? Actually, you just missed the one on the functionality of humankind but, oh no, you realise you really can’t function and you are humankind, and will you ever be able to function? Oh no. Oh. No.

Mam says: “DO YOUR EFFING WORK” Meaning: “Ah man, we don’t need to do anything. Remember how last term we did nothing and it was fine, like?” No. I repeat, no. NO. The 24-hour library is like childbirth. You’ll drink at least seven cups of coffee whilst writing that essay, but guess what you forgot? Your water just broke but they lock the 24-hour bathroom between the hours of 6am and 9am. You may just pray you don’t fall down the stairs of the Museum Building in the pitch black whilst trying to find a bathroom you’ve only ever mythically heard of. Since the 24-hour also secretes the same amnesia hormones as childbirth, you’ll think it’s a great idea, as you always do, to leave those 6000 words until the last three days before they’re due, instinctively chanting “sure it’s pure grand, like” to anyone who dares ask you about your progress. Like all the other times, it’s not pure grand like. Not sleeping for

72 hours is never pure grand like, and is in fact a mode of torture commonly used on prisoners of war. You are not a prisoner of war, you are a college student. Do yourself a favour. Start your work a week earlier than you normally would.

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You are not a prisoner of war, you are a college student.

Mam says: “YOUR EFFING EXAMS ARE COMING UP” Meaning: “Exams are ages away, like. That right there is a problem for future me.” It just happens that every May, present me hates past me so very much. I strongly suggest that this time you make life easy for yourself. We have over three months before any of the exam madness starts. Be an Ussher kid. Start doing little half hours here and there between classes and meetups, and the mountain you’ll be facing in May will seem a lot less daunting. Revision and essays are all about overcoming that initial hurdle in your brain that says you can't do it. It’s the same one that has us procrastinating for hours

on the cricket pitch – and loathing ourselves for it. Mam says: “WHAT’S AN EFFING AGM?” Meaning: The term of elections and AGMs has come. Forget everything you just learnt about college life. Come March, the faces of all those B.N.O.C.s you just managed to learn are going to be ousted from their place in Trinity’s society life. With the many committees, organisations and conglomerates in Trinity, it can be hard to keep track. Like Debasish Mridha once said, “Everything is transient [so be an O.C.M.]” I find that the best course of action here is to be exceptionally laissezfaire. Avert your gaze from campaigners, wear sunglasses in the Arts Block if you must, and when you're eventually forced to go to that one AGM for your mate’s friend, bring your vice of choice to get you through - be it coffee, Zelda, or vodka. In the end, think of what your mam would say if you were getting all

worked up about losing out on being the secretary of the Holographic Kite Society. Honestly, she would probably be devastated, because holographic kites are cool.

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It’s a bit like the American Dream — a second chance at redemption.

Mam says: “YOU CAN EFFING TURN IT ROUND” Meaning: Hey, so maybe first term wasn’t the best. Freshers’ flu became superbug season, and that lab report wasn’t your crowning achievement. The great thing about Hilary term is having the opportunity to turn it all around. It’s a bit like the American Dream — a second chance at redemption. Anything can happen in Hilary term. Watch the grass grow greener and listen to the sounds of cans being cracked open by the swarms of students on the cricket pitch. You can, and will, turn it around. Have a can, but maybe just bring that lab report with you too.

Quest for the best: Slices of Dublin Sinéad Barry

Contributing Writer

On a journey into the the cheesy, the crusty and the cheap, any New Year’s Resolutions to eat healthy are set to one side as Sinéad Barry sets out to find the best pizza Dublin has to offer.

The Buttery

Ristorante Romano

Ray’s

Dublin Pizza Company

With that, my pizza binging had truly begun. The next stop on my list was Trinity’s own Buttery. Unfortunately, my experience here was unenlightening. For €5, you can buy half a pizza and half a plate of chips. If you’re looking for a lot of food for little money, this is certainly worthy mentioning. The quality of the pizza may heed room for improvement, however. It can often be a case of hit and miss. I would be willing to look past the significant lack of crispness in the pizza’s base if it wasn’t for the second and unforgivable crime committed against pizza; a notable lack of cheese. In the future, I’ll be willing to make the venture outside campus for better pizza. That being said, for €5 you won’t leave The Buttery hungry.

Mildly disillusioned with the all-powerful lure of pizza, I continued my quest. This brought me to Capel St, a bit of a walk from campus but well worth the visit. Walking into the quaint little restaurant, it was as though Romano’s had cut off a section of Italy and dropped it into inner city Dublin. The waiters conversed in Italian and there were flowers on every table. They offer a €7.50 lunch menu with a selection of unpronounceable but delicious sounding pasta dishes and 9” pizzas. I opted for the Vegetariana; topped with mozzarella, olives, onions, peppers and mushrooms, with a garnish of rocket. My faith in pizza was well and truly restored. No more need be said.

It wouldn’t be worth writing a Trinity’s students guide to pizza without mentioning Ray’s in Temple Bar. A fiveminute walk from campus, this is the perfect escape for anyone craving a treat following that particularly stressful and hunger-inducing assignment. I chose the €9.95 deal consisting of a drink and a 12” pizza with two toppings, in this case half ham and half spinach - don’t knock it ‘til you’ve tried it. The toppings were dancing with freshness and the cheese was the perfect amount of stringy. For an affordable €3.50 you can buy by one of their generously sized New Yorkstyle slices, appropriately presented on a paper plate. Busiest in the late hours of the night, you should be able to catch them at a quiet time during daylight.

Choosing the best pizza in Dublin, as I’m sure you can understand, is no easy feat and so it is with due solemnity that I place this prestigious title with Dublin Pizza Company. Located on Aungier Street, the walk from College is worth it for this literal slice of heaven. More similar to a hatch in the wall as opposed to an actual restaurant, this tiny takeaway allows you to watch as your pizza is brought into being and cooked in a woodfire oven right in front of you. With an array of Italianstyle pizzas, a lunch menu, and even a vegan option to choose from, I was impressed from the outset. Reverting back to basics, I ordered a margherita pizza for €9, and oh, was it worth it. The pizzamaking experts at Dublin Pizza Company are worthy recipients of the crown, with the entire experience perfectly summed up as positively mouth-watering.

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Honest to Goodness My quest to find the greatest pizza in Dublin began in Honest to Goodness, tucked away on Dame Avenue. The peaceful seclusion means you can almost walk right by without noticing it’s even there. This bright and friendly café offers an extensive menu that extends far beyond the realm of pizza - but who in their right mind would choose something else over pizza? Feeling adventurous, I decided to go for some toppings with a twist; mozzarella, gorgonzola and egg. It was a risky decision that left me wary of what was to come. When it arrived, however, all doubt melted away as I was greeted with a white wonderland on crust. It takes a certain calibre to pull off a fried egg on top of pizza but against all odds, Honest to Goodness succeeded. The gorgonzola was tasteful without being overpowering, and the base was thin and crispy. The total bill for a 12” was €12 between two, and I definitely feel that it was money well spent.

1 2 34 5

2/5

4.5/5

I would be willing to look past the significant lack of crispness in the pizza’s base if it wasn’t for the second and unforgivable crime committed against pizza; a notable lack of cheese.

4/5

5/5

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It takes a certain calibre to pull off a fried egg on top of pizza but against all odds, they succeeded.

4/5

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Comment

Should we have Christmas exams? Niall Maher and Fiachra MacCanna argue it out. page 18

Is Repeal enough? The way in which we approach the campaign for abortion rights has recently evolved in an attempt to gain traction with the modern electorate – but could this have implications for the diversity of the campaign? Aislinn Shanahan Daly argues for the essentiality of organizational integrity within political campaigning. Aislinn Shanahan Daly Contributing Writer

E F O R E CHRISTMAS, THE OHIO Governor John Kasich approved legislation to ban abortion after 20 weeks. In October, the Polish government tried to ban abortion in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities and failed, overcome by mass mobilization. Conservative political forces in many countries are making moves to roll back abortion rights. Although the polls show that the majority of people in this country are in favour of repealing the 8th amendment, our government is refusing to give us the referendum we demand. All over the world, abortion has proven to be a contentious moral and political issue. How we approach this issue as activists needs ongoing scrutiny in order to be as effective and inclusive as possible. Political empowerment is rising in Ireland, with the successful opposition of water charges and the passing of the marriage equality referendum. The issue of abortion rights has reached boiling point, with Students’ Unions across the country and the Union of Students in Ireland being mandated to take pro-choice positions and trade unions officially supporting the campaign. It’s been a turbulent year for the struggle for abortion rights, with two bills attempting to lift current restrictions voted down in the Dáil so far. A change in tone According to a recent Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI poll (October 2016), the majority of this country is pro-Repeal. This obviously entails that the voices of those in favour of repealing the 8th are more prevalent. However, in retaliation, some antichoicers claim the Repeal movement steals their free speech, as evidenced in an article published last month by this paper, “Be wary of a culture where only one voice is heard”. In the 90s, pro-choice activists were

assaulted outside the Dáil by anti-choice groups, and now the anti-choicers seem to be channelling their opposition through media interventions. It is clear that the opposition to the struggle for abortion rights has adapted in order to make itself seem more forthcoming. If we want to truly challenge the current of conservatism that preserves the 8th, it is worth examining the popular engagement people have with abortion rights as a single political issue, and to self-examine our role as activists within the campaign. Political connotations An interesting development in the pro-choice campaign can be attributed to the recent Repeal project. Anna Cosgrave’s work with the Repeal project, alongside artists such as Maser, has stimulated an unconventional and confrontational political aesthetic. I have conflicting views on this as a political tool. The Repeal slogan occupies the space in which the wearer displays their aesthetic identity. It encourages them to dispel their individualism in favour of forming a visual collective. This could be a helpful tool, in that it unites those involved in the struggle through a visual signifier, helping them to effectively band together. It also allows political opinion to occupy space on a commodity, providing a route for people to engage with a sanitized form of political aesthetics which may not be so challenging after all. The entire profits of the project go to the Abortion Rights Campaign (ARC) who organize the annual March for Choice, so the question of corporate ethics and aesthetic implications here may not be entirely relevant. A more pressing question, and one that I feel is relevant to how ideology moves around the Repeal project, is that of political direction.

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If we want to truly challenge the current of conservatism that preserves the 8th, it is worth examining the popular engagement people have with abortion rights as a single political issue, and to selfexamine our role as activists within the campaign

Political organisation Perhaps I am a cynic, but when I see the Repeal jumpers, I’m not overcome with a feeling of political camaraderie. Don’t get me wrong, I know many incredible activists who wear their Repeal jumpers

proudly, and I have a Repeal tote bag myself. But while the project is playing a fascinating role in the media, and in the visual side of the struggle for abortion rights, it cannot act as a substitute for political organisation. The importance of a reflexive democratic organization in politics is made clear through these observations. The Repeal project is easy to engage with regardless of political perspective, because it does not involve a class narrative, and does not propose any ideas of how Ireland should look “postRepeal”. Through linking up with others and forming a strong political consensus that can be democratically challenged, participants are enabled to fight for the most effective strategy and inclusive political line within the movement. I recently had to argue, within a certain group of liberal abortion rights activists, in favour of the use of the “Free, Safe, Legal” slogan – some feared that it would alienate the “soft vote”. The “soft vote” usually refers to the undecided: in this situation, those who only agree with legal abortion in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities. It makes little sense to object to the use of this slogan for fear of exclusion. If we do not insist on abortion being part of Ireland’s publicly funded maternity care, then we are alienating those who suffer economic deprivation and oppression. If abortion provided by the public health system was unsafe, then why would we demand it at all? And of course, its legalisation is a core tenet of our demands. Within most venerated circles of abortion rights activists, the issue of this particular slogan has been rolled out and agreed upon. A situation like this one proves the lack of accountability for inadequate political responses when activism exists without a strong organizational core. Our demands This is not to say that we must ensure some kind of ideological purity within the campaign. A diverse range of political interests are currently engaged with

the struggle. We should demand intersectionality from this campaign. We should demand a campaign that empowers working class women to rise up and reach their full political potential, a campaign that is inclusive of people of diverse gender identities who are affected by restrictive abortion laws, a campaign that recognizes that it is impossible for asylum-seeking women in the Direct Provision system to travel for abortions, and that they are forced to have them illegally. As a socialist feminist, I demand that my body should not be policed by the state, and I feel obliged to challenge successive governments that have allowed themselves to infringe my bodily autonomy. This includes holding the Labour party accountable for their U-turn, after an unacceptable history of voting down legislative attempts to mitigate abortion, and challenging Sinn Féin’s limited position in favour of abortion in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities. The preservation of Ireland’s constitutional restrictions on abortion is one of the many unforgivable traits that this so-called “democracy” has to offer us. The Irish government, plagued by conservatism for countless years, has failed to accommodate for its

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A situation like this one proves the lack of accountability for inadequate political responses when activism exists without a strong organizational core

imposition of austerity on working people, has been complicit in the housing crisis and its devastating death toll, has shoved the issue of the underfunded public health system under the rug, and has allowed our airports to be used as pit stops for US war planes. All of these issues need to be considered alongside the campaign for abortion rights. In showing solidarity to all who are oppressed, we are even stronger and more cohesive in the fight for economic and social equality. The movement to repeal the 8th can only benefit from understanding the wider struggles in our society, and this understanding can further inform the discussion around the issue in order to be as inclusive as possible. We need to build a sustainable resistance from below to defeat conservatism both from outside and from within the campaign for abortion rights. Principled political opposition to reactionary discourse within feminist activism is absolutely essential if we want to thwart institutional misogyny. When we philosophise about single issues, I think we must always relate to them as components of structural habitats. Abstracting these issues from the failing system under which we live is a grave political mistake.

We need a class narrative to defeat the Alt-Right The key to a strong, coherent movement against the alt-right is mobilising those who were disillusioned with the choice on offer in last November’s election. Rory O’Neill Staff Writer

T IS, AT THE time of writing, the eve of Donald Trump’s inauguration as 45th President of the United States. Hundreds of protests have been planned in towns and cities across North America. The fact that there is such widespread mobilisation in defiance of a President who won the election, albeit by the rules of the game — peculiar and undemocratic as they may be — points towards an increasing polarisation of society in the United States. This will be familiar to us in Europe, we’ve seen breakthroughs for both the radical left and the far-right in recent years; the political centre has collapsed and the parties of social democracy appear to be in terminal decline. It is yet to be seen, however, to what extent this translates into a polarisation of politics across the Atlantic. The Bernie Sanders campaign seemed to indicate the possibility of some kind of a break with the traditional false choice between the Blue and Red wings of Wall Street. Yet since Sanders’ endorsement of Hillary Clinton and his acceptance of a leadership position within the Democratic Party, the chances of a new political

formation or organised tendency look slim. New right-wing politics But what about the right? One of the main stories of Trump’s victory was the apparent ascendancy of the ‘alt-right’. This is the self-adopted label of the new American far-right, who despise the liberal establishment but feel equally disillusioned from the mainstream Republican party. Even the term itself has become mired in controversy — there are many who reject the label outright, arguing that it merely gives a mask of legitimacy to what is little more than white supremacist politics, or even neo-Nazism. On the face of it, the altright is not necessarily any more organised or coherent than the crowds who turned out for Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primaries. The difference is seemingly that while the left has been placed on the backfoot, the far-right has been imbued with a new vigour and confidence in the wake of Trump’s victory. Racist attacks and hate crimes rose immediately following Trump’s victory. Richard Spencer, the prominent white nationalist credited as founder and leader of the alt-right movement, has hailed the Presidential election as a moment of inspiration. Speaking to

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The Bernie Sanders campaign seemed to indicate the possibility of some kind of a break with the traditional false choice between the Blue and Red wings of Wall Street

Canada’s CBC news in recent days, he claimed that “Trump’s movement... was fundamentally about identity for white people”. This captures the essence of what the alt-right is about. Much of what Spencer says is grandstanding and he is undoubtedly exaggerating the extent to which his movement fuelled Trump’s victory. Missing in his analysis is Clinton’s failure to mobilise the same coalition of working class voters and racial minorities that brought Obama to power. Trump, after all, lost the popular vote. There is, nonetheless, a hardened far-right core — for whom Trump personifies the aggrieved American white man — who felt threatened by an Obama Presidency and the Black Lives Matter movement. Fascism always plays upon a nation’s demons — in the case of the alt-right, this is evident in Spencer’s language of race war and white identity. CBC quote him as saying "We conquered this continent. Whether it's nice to say that or not, we won. We got to define what America means. We got to define what this continent means. America, at the end of the day, belongs to white men." The media organs of the altright, such as Breitbart, are known to have peddled false stories demonising refugees

and immigrants, constructing a narrative about white European identity under threat. Numerous figures in the alt-right movement have links to the Ku Klux Klan. Trump himself may not be a fascist, but there is a racist core attempting to build such a movement. How to respond The alt-right may hit a plateau, and find it lacks the leadership, organisation and unity required to make a major political breakthrough. But what is clear is that the champions of white supremacy have drawn encouragement from the events of the last year. The key to fighting fascism is to recognise it at its genesis and starve them of the space to organise or spread their poisonous ideas. In practice, however, this requires principled left-wing politics that can find an audience in the labour movement and all sections of the oppressed. If 2016 was the year that saw the rise of the alt-right and the genesis of a new fascist movement, then 2017 must be the year of the fightback. It was the failure of the liberal Democratic establishment to offer any cogent alternative to the horror story of modern American capitalism that produced Clinton’s electoral demise. Any hopes for reversing the advance of the

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What is clear is that the champions of white supremacy have drawn encouragement from the events of the last year

alt-right instead lie to the left. Sanders’ strategy of working inside the Democratic Party entirely misses the mark. It was precisely his outsider status that made him a credible alternative to a failed two-party system for so many. Hundreds of thousands on the streets across the continent in protest against Trump’s inauguration, high school student walk-outs, Black Lives Matter — these are the forces which can provide the basis for a movement that can beat back the far-right. There must, however, be a political coherence to such a movement. It must be built on a rejection of the liberal centre, the most convenient vehicle of power for Wall Street. It must combat the far-right with solidarity for those whom they hate. In practice this means a labour movement which is explicitly anti-racist and pro-LGBTQ+ freedom. Key to this must surely be the mobilisation of working people. We should have no time for unsubstantiated tropes about Trump’s victory being the work of a racist, uneducated working class. Perhaps the most important factor in November’s result was the disillusionment of working class voters with both major candidates. But unless the left offers an alternative, it leaves a vacuum the far-right will be only too happy to try and fill.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Comment

The SU is in need of fundamental structural reform Jack Kennedy explains why the SU is in need of structural reform, citing independence from College and more specialised services among his arguments. Jack Kennedy Contributing Writer

HE TRINITY STUDENTS’ UNION is broken. This is not the fault of this year’s sabbatical officers or class reps, or anyone doing wonderful work on the organisation’s behalf, but it is something inherent and something that needs to be rectified as soon as possible – because as long as the SU continues to be structured in the way it is, the wonderful work done by all these people is at least partially going to waste and a massive disservice being done to the student body. The SU provides three really wonderful main services: advocacy, the welfare office, and a newspaper. It’s a collective bargaining organisation for students that enables us to negotiate properly with College authorities on contentious issues, and to lobby as a collective on issues in Irish politics that are of interest to students. The welfare office provides sexual health information, sensible drug education, loans and counselling to students, free of charge. Finally, the SU offers a second student-run newspaper, separate to this one. These are things we need now and will always need. However, operating these three organisations as one, inexorably tying it to College administration and making membership compulsory is ludicrous – and yet, this is the system we have.

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[The TCD SU] increasingly looks more like an arm of the university than anything else

Advocacy First and foremost, the nature of the SU means its primary purpose – advocacy to College authorities and the Irish political sphere in general on behalf of students – is effectively impossible to fulfil. It is inexorably tied to the College administration in a way that represents a colossal conflict of interest. While Trinity should absolutely facilitate a Student’s Union by providing it with facilities and consulting it on important matters and so forth, no such union can possibly claim to be able to keep the administration in check when it relies on said administration to force every new student to join it, and to collect its mandatory yearly dues. With mandatory membership, and with the Union filling roles that College health services really should, it increasingly looks more like an arm of the university than anything

else. While it seems quite unlikely to happen anytime soon (failing a return to the tire-burning student activism of the 60s), the College could in theory put an immediate end to any serious dispute by evicting the SU from House 6 and completely cutting off its budget. On top of that, the fact that membership is mandatory simply sweeps the legs out from under any stance the SU takes. How can it claim to be speaking on behalf of the student body as a whole when the turnout at its last election was less than 24%? If only interested students joined, the participation rate within the organisation would be astronomically higher, and there might be some actual weight to the Union’s lobbying. As it stands, however, any claim that it represents the student body as a whole is either gross misinformation or a barefaced lie. One voice for all the students of the College is a wonderful idea on paper, but in practice there are 16,000+ students with many diverse points of view. It is morally dubious to speak for students who never gave permission to be spoken for, didn’t vote on the stance in question or the officers communicating it, and may well disagree with what is being said. In the case of most political lobby and advocacy groups, if they cease to represent your interests at any point you can simply leave, but with the SU you’ve no choice but to continue being spoken for. Personally I have happened to agree, in the past, with most positions the SU has taken, but this is untrue for many within the student body and may not continue to be true for me and others. Though I might strongly disagree with someone who takes a pro-life stance, for instance, I fail to see why the SU should, supposedly on their behalf, be organising a pro-choice lobby group. This work should still be done, but there’s no need to include people who don’t want to be included.

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One voice for all the students of the College is a wonderful idea on paper, but in practice there are 16,000+ students with many diverse points of view

Welfare Secondly, the welfare office is hamstrung in the execution of its important duty by its ties to the SU. As I said, I think such an office is vital for the health and wellbeing of students and wouldn’t think to question the quality of the work that it does under the status quo. However, it is unnecessary to have it tied to a political organisation, and it is unclear why the position of Welfare Officer is best served by an elected official

rather than by a trained specialist whose year-onyear job is specifically that of said position. Something connected to College health services but with the mandate of the welfare office would be capable of filling the role much more effectively. Failing that, even a student-run organisation, in many ways the same as the existing welfare office, only not tied to any kind of political advocacy would be preferable. Though the SU has thankfully in recent years taken very enlightened positions on such issues as sexuality, gender identity and mental health, there is no reason why a less openminded student body couldn’t have pushed it in a much less favourable direction (or won’t in future). If such a thing were to occur, it would at the very least cause massive internal tension within the Union, making it hard for the welfare office to do its good work, or worse still potentially change the office’s mandate so it would be less open to helping some of the most marginalised within the College community. Communications/ Newspaper Finally, while the need for at least two student news organisations on campus is vital, the idea that either of these positions should be filled by a publication with a College-paid, SU-elected editor is ridiculous. It might seem democratic to have the student body select the head of as influential an institution as The University Times, but the fact that each successive editor is groomed in advance (to the point that they often run unopposed) negates any possible benefit. Furthermore, granting this editor supreme power to appoint staff and fire them means accountability is a pipe dream. There is no mechanism for impeachment, save a vote from these very same staff members. Dissenting voices can either be removed or pressured into leaving themselves, and are unlikely to appear in the first place by virtue of the editor having recruited the whole staff. But don’t take my word for it – the damning report leaked last summer about the culture within UT confirms all of this. That report was never published by the SU, nor were any of its recommendations adopted by the board of trustees, which hints at the second problem with UT: its close ties to the rest of the Union. The editor of The University Times is a sabbatical officer

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it is unclear why the position of Welfare Officer is best served by an elected official rather than by a trained specialist

of the Students’ Union. They’re elected in the same elections, they receive the same benefits and operate a department that in most ways is functionally the same as the rest of the Union. It’s easy to see how this would cause problems and conflicts of interest in reporting on the Union’s activities. If the paper were to be critical of a policy, or to report unfavourably on the campaign of a candidate who ended up being elected to the SU, this would put the paper’s staff and the relevant officer in a rather uncomfortable situation, given that they then have to work together. In the most extreme cases, the UT/SU relationship suffers from the same problem as the SU/ College one: the SU could limit or cut off the paper’s budget. Given these close personal and organisational ties, the staff of UT have huge incentives to be less critical of the Union than a more independent organisation would be. Like a national government, the SU needs to be constantly scrutinised to ensure it is upholding its duty to its members - but there is a reason that we’re suspicious of news organisations operated by governments. Union should admit need for reform Addressing these issues needs to be at the top of the SU mandate. Advocating for more student spaces on campus, and lobbying the government against the introduction of fees and loans are extremely important things, and things the Union should be spending time and effort on – but first it’s time for the Union to stand up and admit that it needs reform, and lots of it. It needs to distance itself from the College authorities to whom it represents us, and fund itself independently. It needs to separate into at least three individual organisations, each capable of fully carrying out their duty to the student body. And it needs to admit, to itself and to us all, that it’s not able to represent everyone on campus and probably shouldn’t be trying to – and therefore immediately cease its policy of mandatory membership. This year’s team of officers has been working extremely hard, and I’ve no doubt they will continue do everything they can to serve the College community in the coming months. But they could be doing so much more, if only they were let.

Why the state must fund the arts L

For access and inclusivity, there is no alternative to publically providing art and culture Michael Foley Comment Editor

AST NOVEMBER, TAOISEACH ENDA Kenny admitted that the state has failed, repeatedly, to put arts and culture at the front of its public policy. Were the

government to attempt to tackle this issue, it would be long overdue: arts funding currently sits at 0.1 per cent of the state’s GDP, languishing far behind the 0.6 per cent EU average.

Funding is always an issue when we talk about the arts, or culture in general. And where it comes from matters: private, public, philanthropic, fundraised, crowdsourced. Whether it’s the bake sales held by DU players to fund productions or PWC corporate sponsorship, each particular means of funding has its pros and cons. Crucially, however, state funding for the arts is vital because of its ability to secure financial stability and

transcend the profit-motive; the perfect environment for creation.

Ethos informs art There is a creeping trend of privatisation that is beginning to tread upon the arts; it should not be met with a shrug. Britain, for example, established a capitalist welfare state which promoted public provision of goods after World War II. In establishing this welfare state they also established the state funded British Broadcasting Corporation. However, the Conservative Party in the UK , who have already privatised public services such as the Royal Mail, have been corroding this market-provision and are working to outsource public services entirely to the freemarket. They are currently conducting a review of the BBC; something which should not inspire optimism for the broadcaster’s future.

If we remove the state from the creation, broadcasting, and financial backing of art and culture we will lose a vital public service. The BBC is a unique service, much more so than RTÉ: the BBC is funded entirely by the state, whereas RTE features advertising; the BBC’s ethos is to enrich the lives of the British public. RTE provides news and entertainment in a way which is quite similar to a private channel like Sky, as they have to consider which programmes will bring in more advertising and sponsors. The BBC is something RTE should aspire to be. There is immense value to an ethos which promotes art for art’s sake

while maintaining its public duty to educate and enrich society with stimulating and diverse programming for the entire public — not just those who can afford it. This combination of diverse aesthetic programming and purposively educative content cannot be replicated by private interests, who are concerned mainly with return, or those who must grapple for funding, whose projects will be modelled in a manner to be deemed financially and socially viable.

A State’s investment in art and culture makes art is a public service; a financially secure public initiative motivated by service instead of profit. A good example is BBC radio 4: funded completely by the taxpayer with no advertising. The perennially award-winning radio station — which features excellent cultural discourse and spoken word entertainment — is not at the mercy of private interests who will only fund or pay more for programming which reaches a mass audience. Obviously the BBC, as a public service, want as many people as possible to tune in to its broadcasts. But the power of catering to both the mass and the niche, to educate and stimulate, without the pressure of profit is of immense value to society. Service dichotomy Comparing the work of BBC 4 to Sky Arts is an interesting dichotomy. Sky Arts is an achievement in its own right; essentially the only televised channel fully devoted to the arts. While Sky Arts provides excellent tailored programming, it’s origin in the Murdoch empire limits the range it can offer its viewers. For every risky or niche

area in which the channel invests, it must counterinvest in programming that will guarantee viewers and subsequent ad revenue. Otherwise a private enterprise such as Sky Arts isn’t a viable commercial venture. On saturday at 9p.m, post reality show prime time, Sky Arts aired Discovering: Meatloaf. whereas BBC 4 aired Lost Kingdom of Central America which detailed the settlements of ancient Costa Rica. Of course while I’m not suggesting that a publicly funded broadcaster shouldn’t fund Meatloaf documentaries, I will leave you to decide which is more commercially viable. There used to be two channels: Sky Arts 1 and Sky Arts 2. Now there is just Sky Arts. Philanthropy Of course, the obvious argument against government funding of arts programming, or arts and cultural initiatives in general, is that the government has a finite amount of money which it can spend. Those who criticise the government funding of artistic and cultural initiatives, inist there are other other preferable routes. This is way it is in America. In Britain there was a culture of collective public cultural provision linking back to medieval; in the US, museums were founded by wealthy families, whose descendants currently sit on the boards of the major art foundations. With low taxes and low public spending, philanthropy is a far greater giver to arts in the US than it is at home. But should we let the axe fall on the arts budget and promote this style of funding?

There’s one significant issue: often billionaires and millionaires are more likely to donate to “high-art” such as the opera or the ballet as opposed to youth theatres in rural Ireland. Pierre Bourdieu's theory of cultural capital helps to explain this phenomenon. Essentially, different genres of art have different cultural capital embodied within them which is associated with particular socio-economic groups. Opera or classical music has cultural capital which is indicative of a higher socioeconomic class. Whereas folk or rock music doesn’t and so it is less likely to be the benefactor of philanthropy. So often philanthropists will want to associate themselves with “high-art”. The problem here is there simply isn’t the analytical broad concern for all citizens and cultures which publicly-funded arts initiatives bring to the table. Philanthropist Dame Vivien Duffield describes philanthropy as the icing on the cake, one that cannot properly exist without the base and security of government funding. Government funding leads a social example of what aspects of society deserve investment while Duffield also points out that, proportionally, “the poor give more than the rich”. She insists that if we relied solely on this method of philanthropy, it would leave us culturally poorer. State funded art and culture initiatives enrich society in a way which other forms simply can’t. It’s easy, particularly during economic stagnation, to forget about the arts. But if don’t make our voices heard — we risk surrendering some of our greatest advances, cultural treasures we could never get back.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Comment

Why sell out? Why and at what point do we sell out to corporate life? Jane Purdom Staff Writer

HE BIG FOUR IN the world of business, the Big Five in the world of law – any final year student knows what these terms mean. Multinational firms that have set up in Ireland for what some may consider questionable interests, looking to entice soon-to-begraduates at every possible opportunity. This interest is not unidirectional, with a sizeable number of final year students flocking to apply and ideally pursue what is often a minimum three-year training contract with one of these massive companies. The contract usually involves a rigid exit clause, long hours, and a far from “adventurous” start to your adult life. So one has to ask – why? If one considers what many think of as “the dream” – travelling the world before settling down to a glamorous and innovative career doing what you love – it has to be asked: when did a graduate contract with a big organisation become a more appealing option? Research took me initially to first year students. I knew not to go in search of answers from any younger group; it is hard to imagine a class of children telling me that, rather than wanting to be singers and superheroes, they instead would like to pursue a three-year audit contract with Deloitte. On attempting to discover if first year students had already resigned themselves to one of these streamlined graduate programs, I found that the majority had not. Many new Arts and Science students were confident that, despite a lack of paid graduate opportunities, they would secure one in their field, and would never even consider a graduate contract with one of these multinational organisations. The breakdown of degree disciplines that the likes

of PwC and KPMG pride themselves on hiring at entry level showed me that many of these students would at some point change their minds. It is just a question of finding out where and how this massive shift in outlook and ambition occurs. The sophister outlook I contacted third and final year students who were now considering, or had just signed, a graduate contract with a multinational. I initially thought that I would be met with a degree of what some may consider denial – a rigid belief that this was not selling out, that this had been a dream all along. However, millennials as a generation are thoughtful and more aware of ourselves than our predecessors, and so this was not the case. As contemporary living has become so inherently complex, so had this decision. Selling out? We won’t be earning that much money, or at least not initially. The promise of salaries doubling, even trebling, on completion of exams is certainly an enticing tool for attracting graduates. Not being able to travel? Well, what if you’ve already lived in the USA, or Canada, and with this contract can work for six months in Southeast Asia if you so wish? In this case, it can’t be denied that graduate recruitment in these firms is doing a great job engaging with their target group. A rational decision With this information, I could understand how many students rationalised their decision to sign on the dotted line with a corporate giant. However, as a generation of critical thinkers and analysers with a stronger sense of social responsibility than any of our predecessors, I had to consider if the answers that I had received merely skimmed the surface of what might potentially be a life-altering decision. I had to wonder if these young people had, like myself, grappled with the socioeconomic consequences of the corporate world that they were queueing up to enter.

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The same critics then signed contracts with multinationals that openly and actively supported Apple’s appeal of this ruling

Many of us had strong opinions on the now infamous Apple tax case of 2016, arguing that this money should indeed be taken from the big dogs, and given to the Irish people through services such as healthcare and education. The same critics then signed contracts with multinationals that openly and actively supported Apple’s appeal of this ruling, solely for monetary gain. On a personal level, I found that my reckoning with this moral contradiction lay in a sense of responsibility. I felt that I owed it to my parents, having invested so heavily in my education, to build a wellpaying and solid career. I felt that I owed it to other women to enter into the world of business, as even one more female in the world of tax had to improve the infuriating lack gender balance in the industry. Furthermore, what effect would one person's decision not to conform to the system actually have on society? Can one person really make any impact or effect change? In this sense, the two sides of the argument are, perhaps, the two sides of our own rationalisations.

the standards within it – or perhaps reconsidering my career path completely. Perhaps I should instead devote my professional career to directly combatting the inequalities that so evidently frustrated me?

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I felt that I owed it to other women to enter into the world of business, as even one more female in the world of tax had to improve the infuriating lack of gender balance in the industry.

When considering the power of an individual to change a rigid system, I found myself questioning whether this sense of duty that I had was itself flawed. Surely if truly advocating for change, I should consider not attempting to help balance the gender of an industry, but rather trying to redefine

The real world The final piece of the puzzle lies with people that have made this journey, and transitioned from the world of student ideals to adult reality. Having spoken with someone who has been in the business world for nearly ten years now, I instinctively expected to be met with a sort of bemused belittlement, and to be told that I would understand more once I too had made the jump to the “real world”. However, my fears were unfounded, and I was met with answers of genuine understanding and agreement. “Of course you consider that seventeen-yearold lad in you, that wanted to play for Ireland or start a band or whatever. But as I got older I found out that the best way to be was to get a job that facilitated the lifestyle you want. I love helping out – and it’s through this job that I’ve had the opportunity to sit on the board of a huge nonprofit organisation”. When I asked if he thought he was contributing to the bigger issue of social and economic inequality, I was met with a confident no: “I don’t believe that Ireland’s

issues, like homelessness, are indirectly or directly to blame on the likes of multinationals. Our companies are paying massive taxes that aren’t being spent properly. That’s not on us”. So there you have it. If you want to change the world, go into politics, not business. But is it really that simple? My research into the modern world, where corporate giants meet sociallyconscious millennials, taught me that the idea of “selling out” is far from simple. Deciding whether or not you are compromising on values is a deeply personal and complex task. Speaking with individuals at different stages in their journeys showed me that some do consider following this path to be crossing over to the dark side, while others see it as a genuine opportunity to better themselves, advance their own prospects, and possibly make the world a better place at the same time. As “selling out” is perhaps a truly subjective thing, the novelist Dorothy Sayers may lend a hand in attempting to define such a prospect: “to make a deliberate falsification for personal gain is the last, worst depth to which either scholar or artist can descend in work or life”. Perhaps, if you truly believe that your choices aren’t compromising your own morals or beliefs, then you have nothing to worry about in terms of “selling out”.

What Apollo House tells us about Ireland Bláithín Sheil explores the context behind Apollo House and what it says about Irish society Bláithín Sheil Deputy Comment Editor

OVING INTO A P O L L O HOUSE was not an appropriate response to the housing crisis, said Owen Keegan, Chief Executive of Dublin City Council. Well then Owen, what would be an appropriate response? We could start with any sort of response. Anything at all. That would be a good start indeed. He finds it difficult to comprehend that an organised group of civil disobedients would feel the need to house people in substandard accommodation, when there are apparently enough beds in proper shelters. This is highly ironic because the problem stems directly from bad administration, and contrary to his statement, there are still hundreds of homeless people. An obvious reason Perhaps the action is being taken because there are in fact not enough beds around, and perhaps this action is part of a larger expression of public discontent at the general situation. There should not be a need for such significant emergency accommodation. I wonder why this is happening, then? Eirigí, Home Sweet Home, and this movement in general are about more than housing 40 people until the 11th of January. This problem has gone on for so long; every Christmas, the usual videos and articles about helping the homeless come out. The fact that this is expected and anticipated shows how dire the situation actually is. It is unfair to accuse people who have celebrity status of being

opportunists. Owen Keegan stated in an interview to Pat Kenny on Newstalk that “Irish people are suckers for celebrity endorsement”. So what if they are? So what if they look good by helping? Surely the results achieved by gaining the full attention of the media and actually housing some people, albeit for a short period of time, outweigh the potential selfish interests they may or may not have in gaining good publicity? The preexisting public campaign has expanded as a result of the occupation of Apollo House. It seems these days nobody can do anything charitable out of the goodness of their heart without automatically being pinned as being in it for themselves. Society is so individualistic that even public officers can’t see beyond their own noses and realise that not everybody is as selfish as they may be. Individualism is promoted so much that we are now sceptical of altruism, automatically assuming that everyone is in it for themselves, to the point where good acts are criticised. When did we start thinking like this? We are individualistic because of life’s current options: get rich or get lost. The alternative is sleeping on the street, paying huge rent for a mediocre house, paying social security but getting nothing in return from the health system. Anyone with a few quid to their name has private health insurance, even if just the most basic level. There is no other option. The greed baffles me. For others, this is not a surprise, but a feature of late-stage capitalism. I hear of some people offering accommodation at a modest rent rather than outrageous prices for little flats of 10

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No, Apollo House is not enough. It is like putting a plaster on the wound, dealing with the symptom but not with the cause

people. One person can see the bigger picture and give a student a reasonable place to stay so that she doesn’t have to commute from Gorey in Wexford to UCD on a daily basis. Meanwhile, others think putting eight people in a three-bed house with one bathroom is acceptable. The new face of homelessness The homeless population now consists of working people and families: people who had good jobs, who are capable of budgeting and paying monthly rent, who are not addicted to drugs or alcohol, who had everything going for them in life. The homeless are just those who struggled a bit too much. Ireland used to be the place where migrants came searching for a better life. In the Celtic Tiger era we had a huge influx of Polish and other eastern European immigrants. Now even they are leaving. A head chef in a reputable restaurant in

Howth, on a good salary — educated, skilled, running a business and managing budgets — cannot afford the rent in north County Dublin, so he is going back to the Czech Republic. The greener pastures were actually barren. This makes me sad. But it also puts the fear of God in me. I had better choose quickly what way to go. I would like to buy a house close to my parents and brothers, beside the sea with a park for my children. Can I do this if I don't sell out and get rich? What happened to living a modest and comfortable life? In recent years the working class used to be able to make it work. Now they can’t. The working class are now pushed into poverty by a once-againspiralling rental market that not even qualified chefs can afford. Students who in most cases come from families able to support them, who previously knew not what economic struggle was, are paying 700 euro a month for a small and mediocre flat.

On the one hand, we see the benefits of developing Dublin City Centre as a centre for international companies, given that it employs so many of our people and attracts more investment. But the purposeful reshaping of the city with high-end luxury accommodation and office spaces pushes rent prices up and creates a safe space for towers of money. Housing has been relegated to lower priority status. The bigger picture No, Apollo House is not enough. It is like putting a plaster on the wound, dealing with the symptom but not with the cause. We need to see the bigger picture. But what is being done about it, and why is it taking organised acts of civil disobedience to give some people a shelter? I thought we had moved past the days of minority groups taking extreme measures to be heard; I thought democracy and elections and equal rights and morality

Credit: Daniel Tatlow meant that we now have other pathways to be heard. Obviously not. It is very rich for State officials to criticise public action in an area that is a consequence of, among many things, bad administration. At the very least they should acknowledge that there is an issue here, and feed us the usual lines that they are “seeking to resolve the issue as soon as possible”. We should be outraged that people are living in an abandoned office with no heating. Apollo House is not a cause for celebration — it is a last resort. We don't live in a democratic state; this is late-stage capitalism. And it is only going to get worse. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. It is no surprise that so many sell out and go corporate, despite having more moral views on the world. If you don’t look after yourself the alternative is so much worse.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Comment

Head2Head Christmas Exams No Niall Maher Contributing Writer

F YOU'RE ANYTHING LIKE me, your Christmas break was bliss: constant gluttony, no real work done and no sleep schedule. It felt bad, but at the same time, so good to take a few weeks to relax after the hectic pacing of the Michaelmas term. Yet this carefree existence is a privilege granted to only this university. Trinity is an exception when it comes to Irish universities for not having exams either before or after Christmas. This is a decision I fully support, because it allows us students to take a less examfocused, holistic approach to education, and ensures that our stress levels are not overloaded. One of the largest benefits of the absence of Christmas exams is that we now have to worry about major exams only once a year. In an alternative system, we would have two periods of extended revision

Yes Fiachra MacCanna Contributing Writer

HEN EXAMS SEEM SO far away they may as well not be there at all, it is all too easy to forget that we actually have them. In the past three months I have not seen enough of the Trinity libraries, and I know I am not the only one. Increasingly, colleges are switching to a semesterbased system, where the academic year is split into two semesters. Modules are taught alongside continuous assessment in two semesters with exams at Christmas or in January and in summer. Trinity College, however, has retained its traditional method of leaving exams until the end of the year. However, dividing the year into two halves would definitely have a great deal of merit. Monitoring Progress Christmas exams in college, just like those in secondary school (the dreaded mocks before our Leaving and Junior Cert, and those spelling tests we had each week since the start of primary school) can be a way to check your progress. You could go to all your lectures, take notes, and go through the all the slides at home afterwards, but sometimes it is hard to know

and we would twice have to go through that miserable cycle of exam season; denial, procrastination and desperation. Instead we now have to cram just once a year and we have the rest of the time off to allow us to pursue our interests . While I acknowledge that having one set of exams does make the summer exams more stressful than if there were two sets, I fail to see how this outweighs the benefits of only having to cram for one set of exams. The largest benefit is that now we are stressed for a much shorter period of time. Professor Patrick Geoghegan, former dean of undergraduate studies, has pointed out that the implementation of Christmas exams would lead to students feeling under constant pressure to study. Without Christmas exams, there is only one period of the year in which we will be under the pressure of exams, which is attractive to all students. We are allowed to throw ourselves fully into the campus lifestyle in the Michaelmas term without the stress of exams which we should be studying for hanging over our heads. how well you are doing and if what you are doing is, in fact, working. With the long time between our annual set of exams, sometimes you need that reassurance that your work is going well, and sometimes you need to find out that you should be doing something different. Exams at Christmas would help make you aware of your weaknesses and where more effort is needed, before it is too late. Too much burden We can all agree, I am sure, that exams are a burden, so it probably sounds insane to say that more exams would create a lesser weight on students, but bear in mind, we would still have the same number of exams just split in two. In the few weeks of study break, you are expected to revise everything you have covered since September. Some of these topics, you may not even remember learning in the first place, and have completely forgotten about since. Having exams on all twelve or thirteen modules of the past year at once is simply too much. Some students, for instance, find it difficult multitasking; all that revision makes it hard to ensure each module gets as much time and effort as the others and as it needs. Failing one module means repeats, and, for third and fourth year students, means failing the whole year. All this stress and anxiety at once can undeniably be overwhelming. When we split the year in

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...the implementation of Christmas exams would lead to students feeling under constant pressure to study

Trinity has arguably the best society life on campus and that is helped by our not having exams right in the middle of the academic year. In Michaelmas term, students can commit to a huge workload without worrying too much about the impact on their academics. This is a driving force behind our vibrant society scene, allowing them to develop uninterrupted. Our societies would not benefit from the start-stop progress caused by Christmas exams. Projects that need constant attention would have to be put on hold at the risk of putting grades into jeopardy. The same can be said of sport: with Christmas exams, there would now be two periods where people must chose to neglect either their sport or studies. A system without Christmas exams gives you choice: the choice to spend your college experience the way you want and not to be shackled in by exams midway through every year. The increase in choice is one of the most important aspects of university life and one we should be wary of restricting by imposing examinations in the middle

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Without Christmas exams, those mistakes you make...won't be permanently recorded on your GPA or prevent you from going on Erasmus next year

of the academic year. Without Christmas exams we have much more freedom than other universities. You are free to pursue studies outside the range of essay titles, free to move from nightclub to nightclub all night. You are, of course, free to neglect all your lectures and tutorials, a decision you may begin to regret come April. Without Christmas exams, those mistakes you make, the decisions not to go to the lecture because you “don't like the lecturer's voice”, won't be permanently recorded on your GPA or prevent you from going on Erasmus next year. I know many first years who, from difficulties fitting into the college lifestyle, had an academically miserable Michaelmas term. Forcing them to do Christmas exams would have made things much worse. It’s true that there are difficulties with only having summer exams: for instance, if you are ill or suffering from the bereavement of a loved one during the exams it will affect your performance. But with the inclusion of Christmas exams you double the chance of that occurring. Going into summer exams

knowing that you’ve already lost up to 50% would be a daunting prospect. It must also be remembered that this is not the Leaving Cert. There are supplemental examinations you can take, should you be unfortunate enough to mess up your summer exams. Studying for summer exams is miserable but not as miserable as studying for them and also having to study again at Christmas. A college experience without Christmas exams is a freer college experience: an experience where you go to choose your own achievements and mistakes. It is a much happier college experience. You don't have to go through periods of intense cramming every 6 months. You can enjoy your Christmas break or Michaelmas term at your discretion. If you are still harbouring any doubts about not having Christmas exams, you should talk to any student who who has done Schols. They can tell you, with much more passion than I can, just how enjoyable and stress-free having two sets of exams a year is.

half, we are examined on Christmas “Break” what has just been covered Christmas is a time to in the last semester, and, enjoy, relax, and forget about thus,study rotas are easier college and work for a few to manage, and stress is days, but assignments can somewhat relieved. prevent us from doing that. I could not help but spend that time around Christmas worrying about those 1500 word essays I had to do, or all the work I had to catch up on. It is harder to book family holidays and ski trips knowing you will have work to do at this time. When the Christmas exams were over in secondary school, Christmas time began for me. I didn’t have to worry about anything else. The stress of exams over the few weeks beforehand dissipating at once was an added bonus.

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Exams at Christmas would help make you aware of your weaknesses and where more effort is needed, before it is too late

Repeats Summer holidays are four months off. People go interrailing, on J1’s, get summer jobs, along with a whole load of other things. Obviously, nobody wants their summer plans cut short by an email telling them have repeats they have to study for. It can be horrible. It is not until freshers’ week before you find out how you did on the repeat and whether you passed or if you are going to have to repeat a year. Nobody wants this. In sum, if the exam was in Christmas, you could do the repeat during the next semester, or at summer with the rest of your exams. You will only be at risk of having to repeat during summer with half of your exams.

Back to our Futures Martin O’Donnell examines what drives people’s decisions around the CAO, why high-point achievers are pushed towards Medicine, and why we need to rethink our current paradigms Martin O’Donnell Contributing Writer

UPPRESSING SIXTH YEAR The Leaving Cert holds a special place in Irish society. The media has a morbid fascination with it, expressed in supplement after supplement in newspapers and with story after story on radio and television. This doesn’t really help my personal attempts to suppress my own Leaving Cert years – years filled with mindless study, unrelenting anxiety, and total lack of a social life. It becomes easier with time, and I had avoided thinking of the dreaded era for quite some time until I discussed the CAO with my cousin at Christmas (although I refrained from recounting my own experience for obvious reasons). At the time, the CAO seemed secondary to actual Leaving Cert – and if I’m being honest, amid the stress, it was an afterthought. I had a rough idea of what I was going to put down – not the exact order, but I had the “gist” of a significant life decision. Each student in my school had one meeting with the school guidance counsellor in order to talk through their CAO choices before the February deadline. As he slowly went through the class, it seemed like he was spending roughly 20–35 minutes with each student. One morning I was called, and dutifully entered the room expecting to miss a class – although in my case, the meeting lasted a mere 10 minutes. I rattled off my

CAO choices, which he wrote down; he noted that I had a good chance of pulling off my first choice based on my Christmas exams; and then he asked me was I happy with my choices and my backups... and, well, that was it. The brevity of our meeting is something that always puzzles me as it was the only meeting I had with a guidance counsellor during sixth year. Surely a life decision of such gravity required more than 10 minutes? Maybe he was in a hurry? Maybe my “cool exterior” fooled him into thinking I was certain of my choices and he believed I could achieve them based on my previous results? Frankly, however, I suspect one of the main reasons for his brevity was that he actually approved of my choice: Medicine. What’s a 625-pointer to do? Medicine as a course perfectly embodies many of the things society views as important: it has a ‘noble’ career with a defined path towards secure employment that leads to good pay and a comfortable life. This was how it was sold to me by my parents, my teachers, and my guidance counsellor. Most of these attractive features are true, and are probably the main reason Medicine has always been one of the highest-points courses in the country. However, this pitch omits one of the most significant drawbacks of Medicine: it takes several years of gruelling study, followed by many years of long hours and training, before these ideals come to be realised, if they in fact ever do. Similar values and

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Medicine as a course perfectly embodies many of the things society views as important: it has a ‘noble’ career with a defined path towards secure employment that leads to good pay and a comfortable life

worth are ascribed to other health science courses and to professions such as law. The conventional “wisdom” is that if you can do one of these courses, or even have a chance of doing them, you should. Adjusting our approach This decision is a massive one for an individual to make at any point, because for many, their choice on the CAO form will play a large role in their later life. Blindly pushing anyone who gets 625 to do Medicine is clearly absurd, regardless of the motivations. Just because a person can do it doesn’t mean they should. This sort of “snobbery” surrounding Medicine, which seems pervasive and undoubtedly drives some students to do the course, should really be abandoned. Instead, when choosing a course, students need to make informed choices. This doesn’t just apply to so-called “high achievers”, but to all students. In some schools, this may already be the case, but it is by no means a universal approach in Ireland. Less emphasis needs to be placed on societal validation, and instead, I feel students should be encouraged to think critically about what they want in life. What are you passionate about? What do you want to explore more? What is important to you? If a person is passionate about business, well then I hope they find their niche and are successful; if a person dreams of becoming a scientist to cure disease, I hope they find the next penicillin; and if a person longs to compose

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Less emphasis needs to be placed on societal validation; instead, I feel students should be encouraged to think critically about what they want in life

poetry, I hope they are the next Kavanagh or Plath. In the end, it may be that what is important to an individual overlap with things that society and our parents believe are important, but students need to come to the decision of their own volition. Importantly, if someone is passionate about and interested in something that doesn’t require a college degree – or even a Leaving Cert for that matter – they should be encouraged to push forward with their aspirations. I vividly remember a classmate in secondary school being told by a teacher to do a college degree instead of an apprenticeship, in spite of the fact he had no interest in college whatsoever. This advice serves nobody except schools looking to up their rankings in the league tables. Similarly, others were told to avoid certain courses because ‘“there are not too many jobs in that area”. While admittedly future careers have to be taken into account, they should not be the “be-all and end-all” – satisfaction with studies surely deserves serious consideration too. Some argue that age should be blamed for the lack of critical thinking – that seventeen- and eighteenyear olds are not ready to make such a major decision, and that people should pick a broad course first before deciding in later years to specialise further. However, this is simply kicking the can down the road. Many students do know what they want to do in the Leaving Cert year, and forcing them to wait is unfair. Those who

do not, or are uncertain, should not be encouraged to pursue something blindly. A cultural shift is required, and the idea of a “gap year” after the Leaving Cert perhaps needs to be encouraged more. This is not to say that certain courses have become too specialised, but that a moderate approach is required – we do not need to make courses too broad either. The big question As for myself, I did not end up altering my CAO course choices between February and the end of the year – so the “gist” of a life decision became the actual decision. At the time, I rationalised that I liked Medicine because I thought it would be stimulating, and I thought I would enjoy interacting with people on a day-to-day basis. The problem is nearly any course fits that description, and I was quite interested in politics, maths, and Irish at the time. It would be naïve of me to think that I didn’t consider my parents’ and teachers’ approval when coming to my decision. Yet, when asked by my cousin what I thought of Medicine, the answer was simple: I really enjoy it, and have since found many reasons to love the course, but I admitted I was lucky. Ultimately, I asked him: What do you want in life? It’s a big question, perhaps one that many of us still can’t answer, but considering the importance of the decision it is probably warranted. I wasn’t really expecting an answer on the spot.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Op-ed

What Trinity means to me, and what Editorial Student solidarity I mean to College, as a graduate D. Joyce-Ahearne evaluates his alumnus relationship with Trinity and with College, making the point that the two are far from the same thing D. Joyce-Ahearne Contributing Editor

AST WEEK, IN MY first act as a Trinity College alumnus, I requested my graduate reader’s card for the library. It came within five working days. In my first act as a graduate reader, I then requested a book from stacks. Even though I was told that I had missed the morning call for requests, and that it would be the next day before the book was in, I got an email four hours later saying it had arrived. The next day I went to the Alumni Office in East Chapel to see about accessing wifi in the library as a graduate, as per the instruction in the letter that came with the card. I was asked what year I graduated (as it was this year the woman told me I wasn’t on her system yet) and then my name. I was then given a card with my TCD Guest username and password, and told I had access to the wifi for the next thirty days. Should I continue to need access after that, I just had to call in and it would be sorted. This exchange took place in under ninety seconds. Seamless In my four years as an undergraduate in Trinity, never, never, have I experienced the wheels of College operating in such a functional and straightforward manner. It all happened exactly as it was supposed to. I wasn’t told to come back or wait, or, as is so often the case, given no explanation at all as to why things weren’t working. It just worked. Seamlessly. When I heard the woman say that I wouldn’t be on the system yet, my mind went back to my experiences of the Academic Registry and the annual trial of getting a letter proving I was a Trinity student in order to renew my scholarship. Of course I wasn’t on the system. Of course I should have known that nothing had changed,and that this seemingly newfound College efficiency I was experiencing as a graduate was just a fortuitous string of blips of competence that had somehow fallen through the cracks of the perennial, same old malfunctioning bureaucracy. And of course, fittingly, this efficiency would run aground when it came to wifi. I did, after all, spend Michaelmas of my first year on eduroam using my DCU housemate’s login because it was just easier than contending with ISIS. (I see that what used to be ISS is now just called IT Services.) But no. Within seconds of telling me I wasn’t on the system, the woman handed me my username and password. It didn’t seem to matter that I wasn’t on the system. I went to the Ussher and logged in, and it worked

on the first go. None of the drawn out pain of setting up TCDwifi, no struggling to get an appointment with ISIS. It just worked.

who started this year it’s just IT Services. But College remembers, because it was College that presumably changed the name.

As I sit writing this on the first floor of the Ussher, I still haven’t accepted how painless it all was. I’m still waiting for the catch. It can’t have been that easy. It’s never been that easy. I’m waiting for the Ussher Changeover Librocop to throw me over the balcony, to land in the basement and find him already there waiting for me, and for him to whisper “TCD wifi firststeps” into my bloodoozing ear. Because there has always been hardship when it comes to dealing with College on an administrative level. What has changed? What’s going on?

And it’s College, not Trinity, that, through the alumni database, remembers me. And it’s College that sends me emails about alumni things and allows me to access the wifi on campus. But what I mean when I talk about “Trinity”, whether to those who were there with me or people that weren’t, in essence, doesn’t actually exist anymore.

My student card still works to get me into House 6, even though it says that it expired four months ago. This prompted a friend in final year to say: “For once a Trinity admin fuck-up actually benefits students”. She’s right, in the sense that, haphazard and capricious as College’s administration seems, it’s always the student who loses out to its whims, never College. But she was wrong on one key point. I’m not a student. I’m a graduate. Which brings me back to the issue at hand: as a graduate, College has been nothing but competent and accommodating towards me. So again, what has changed? What’s going on? “College” vs “Trinity” I think it’s worth noting the distinction between College and Trinity. Generally, “Trinity” seems to be used when we talk positively about our personal experience of being a student of Trinity College, Dublin (“The student life in Trinity is second to none”), and “College” is used when discussing the University of Dublin as an administrative institution, which is only possible in the negative (“College is taking forever with exam timetables”). Though I think my impression of College as an entity separate from the dayto-day experience of student life is exacerbated by my having been actively involved in student journalism (which, by its nature means you often come up against, and are at odds with, College at its most explicit), I think the distinction holds true: “Trinity” is my friends, my lecturers, my education and my sense of community while an undergrad, which for me was centred around student media. “College” is the faceless (or Prendervostfaced) education-industrial complex behind that – and a bureaucratic nightmare. Graduate life But the reality is that now, as a graduate, my links are fundamentally with College rather than Trinity. Currently, there’s a certain amount of what Trinity was to me still

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When our Trinity days are behind us, College tries to capitalise on our nostalgia for an experience it actively undermined at the time.

What I fondly remember about my time here was “Trinity”, and now that that’s for all intents and purposes gone, as a graduate my only real ties to here are now through College: the antagonist of my undergrad. The only institutional memory that the University of Dublin has is afforded to what I liked least about it. And College knows that. College’s engagement with (and attitude towards) its alumni, as evidenced by my experiences so far, is nothing like how it engages with us as undergrads. Because when the Trinity element, the worthwhile and personal part of our undergrad experience, is effectively over, College knows that it can’t continue its role as antagonist, not when we might be worth something to it one day. Because as a graduate, I’m no longer an expense. I’m potential income. I don’t cost College anything any more, but I might be worth a lot to it one day, alumni philanthropy being a key aspect of the vision of privatised higher education the provost has for Trinity. So College ups its game because it knows it has to, if I’m to think of Trinity College, Dublin thirty years from now when looking for somewhere to dump my millions. Hence my flawless graduate experience so far.

here – I was drinking cans in the Pubs office last Saturday with other graduates and friends in final year – but when the current fourth years leave that’s essentially the end of my experience of Trinity. After that, Trinity as I know it is gone. That’s the nature of the fouryear undergrad turnover. Trinity doesn’t really have institutional memory. First years won’t remember IS Services. Some old hacks might get a cheap laugh out of calling them ISIS, but I wonder how many of them read TN now. To anyone

Nostalgia revenue College seeks to foster a relationship with us as graduates that belies the reality of the role it plays in the undergrad experience. When our Trinity days are behind us, College tries to capitalise on our nostalgia for an experience it actively undermined at the time. The incredible experience of Trinity student life that many of us have is down to other students, working through the publications, the societies, the clubs and the unions. During my time at Trinity, College has been undermining this experience through the exclusion of students from decisionmaking on any meaningful level, the cutting of funding for student activities, and a general attitude of disdain towards the level of work undergrads put into making Trinity what it is. There has been a growing and worrying

culture of decisions being made on a commercial, rather than an educational, basis. With graduates, College tries to fill the vacuum that Trinity has left and hijack our nostalgia so we might one day give money to further the programme of disenfranchisement, disregard and privatisation that College has targeted at undergraduates for several years. To look for money from us to carry this out is low, but to try and cash in and do it in the name of Trinity is odious. College has nothing to do with Trinity, but they know that, in its absence, we might forget that distinction – or just accept College as a stand in for the Trinity that we experienced but that doesn’t last. College knows it can reach out to us as potential benefactors, cynically aware that our nostalgia means we would more than likely rather have some tenuous link to Trinity than none at all. College is banking on us paying up – and in one respect, then, College’s position on graduates is the same as on students: it’s still a numbers game. So with College’s attitude to me thus changed, where do I stand? Does my attitude to College change as a graduate? I hope it stays the same as it was when I was in Trinity. But, as an alumnus, how do I maintain an engaged relationship with Trinity, or have a conscientious stance towards College after I leave? Can I? Or does it even matter? I don’t know what the position of engaged graduate looks like, or if it’s even tenable or useful. Maybe it’s not possible. If the opportunity ever arose, would I give College money? College, that cut student services without letting us know until months after the fact in 2013? College, that spent €91,000 on rebranding, having made those cuts? Of course, speaking now, I say no. If I ever become a wealthy alumnus, College won’t see a red penny of it. I’ll gift TN money for Freedom of Information requests. I say this confidently now, less than a year out of the place, but in thirty years, when my Trinity has been gone for longer? On the back of decades of alumni emails from Trinity College, Dublin, the deviant work of College pandering to my nostalgia for Trinity? I’m still uncertain, as a graduate, how best to combat the increasingly grim culture of Trinity’s evergrowing education-industrial complex. But I know that that uncertainty is all the more reason for us to use our time in Trinity to fight for Trinity’s right to thrive, in spite of the agenda of College. Because while I can’t say for sure what it’s worth as a graduate, while still in Trinity that can be a potent force.

CARTOON

For the first time in years Trinity faces the prospect of industrial action. The current impasse between nonacademic staff and College could be ended through a negotiated settlement; however, we cannot ignore the important implications of the policies College has been pursuing. Our article reports claims of an unofficial policy of replacing permanent positions with short or medium term contracts, along with a freeze on promotions and a drive towards “management lead employee evaluations”. Taken together, these measures represent a systemic effort to undermine the status and conditions of non-academic staff, an effort undertaken over the past number of years. To understand the current situation, it must be placed in the broader context of austerity across the public sector, and in third level institutions in particular. Austerity in the public sector has taken the form of pay cuts, hiring freezes and a move from permanent contracts to temporary ones. The main tool to implement this has been a series of negotiated agreements (Croke Park, Haddington Road, Lansdowne Road) between the government and trade unions — essentially a continuation of the flawed social partnership model. Austerity has affected those working in Trinity as much as anywhere else, with both academic and non-academic staff being worse off now than a decade ago. Some argue that such measures were necessary during times of recession, but that is not the question here. Rather, we are seeing a slow but steady effort to fundamentally restructure how our university works. Some of you have likely used the new gate into College, halfway down Nassau street, that runs past the Berkeley and Ussher library. Perhaps some of you have noticed that there is kiosk there. This kiosk, aimed at tourists, is manned by a member of Noonan Security, a private firm. Why is this important? Because Trinity has its own internal security team. It is the opinion of this paper that we are seeing a creeping privatisation of non-academic work in Trinity. Noam Chomsky writes that “the standard technique of privatization” is to “defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital.” It is a small step to go from an internal, but casual and temporary workforce to tendered private contracts. Privatisation of any form would be disastrous for Trinity, replacing the needs of students with profit as the main motivating factor for those companies running non-academic services within College. Taken alone, a widespread policy of temporary contracts will destroy the College community as it currently exists. Rather than permanent jobs where staff get to know each other and students, and become part of the community, we will have individuals whose precarious employment undermines any long term connection. This fits within a broader move towards a neoliberal university, that churns out students for employment in the corporate world. College board minutes from the 9th of November 2016 state that “a list of the desirable graduate attributes had now been identified and communicated by employers in a consultation process.” As much as College likes to sell itself as an experience and community, an institution that seeks learning and education, Dylan Joyce Ahearne is correct in his OpEd that we face an “increasingly grim culture of Trinity’s ever-growing education-industrial complex.” These issues - Student fees, slashed pay and conditions, increasingly precarious employment, the constant presence of corporate bodies on campus — are all interlinked and must be fought in tandem. As students, what can we do? The short answer is to show solidarity with non-academic workers, especially if the conflict escalates to industrial action. We have already seen admirable cooperation between USI and SIPTU, IFUT, IMPACT and the TUI, with trade unionists marching alongside students at the October 19th USI march. TCDSU should stand in solidarity with SIPTU and UNITE within Trinity. There are numerous examples of worker-student solidarity; in last few years across the United States, students have formed Student Labour Action Committees to cooperate with workers within their colleges. These kind of coalitions a necessity. The only other option is a hollow husk of a university, more concerned with renaming floors of the library after wealthy donors than with ensuring permanent contracts and deserved promotions for their staff.

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Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

InDepth The gender gap in college courses Data from the Higher Education Authority provides insight into the gender disparity both between academic disciplines, and third-level institutions themselves Jack Kennedy Contributing Writer

HE HIGHER E D U C AT I O N AUTHORITY (HEA) publishes a wealth of data about enrolment in the institutions it funds each year, including seven universities, fifteen institutes of technology and four part-funded colleges. Between them they represent the overwhelming majority of third level education in Ireland, and therefore the statistics are a valuable insight into the demographic makeup of Ireland’s higher education institutions. I did some analysis on the most recent set of numbers (2014/15) to see what they can tell us about Ireland’s places of learning. I chose to focus on the attribute which has the largest effect on education, statistically – gender. Large disparities The first important thing to note about gender in Irish third level education is that in total there are roughly equal numbers of men and women (as the HEA does not apparently make allowance for those identifying as non-binary, regrettably) enrolled – 49.33% and 50.67% respectively. However, there are quite large disparities in individual categories when the data is examined more closely. For instance, there is a considerable correlation between the type of institution and its gender makeup – institutes of technology are overwhelmingly male dominated, and colleges are disproportionately full of female students. Universities lie somewhere in the middle, almost balanced. There are various potential explanations for this. One is subject breakdown. Institutes of technology offer more science, engineering and computer focused courses, which are disproportionately male. Colleges are almost entirely focused on education, an area that consistently attracts more women than men. Colleges and universities also tend to have higher CAO requirements than ITs, and girls consistently outperform boys at second level in almost every subject. Gender balance also varies with age. The differences are far less pronounced than those along institutional lines, but still large enough to be significant. In the 1721 age range, the numbers are relatively balanced, with

slightly more women than men, but after that there’s a steep decline. Only 46.6% of students aged 25-29 are female, and the number for over 30s is only slightly better. This isn’t due to fewer women choosing to pursue postgraduate studies – women in fact make up more of the postgrad student body in Ireland than men do (by about 5 percentage points), which should in theory skew the statistics in the opposite direction. This must mean that more men choose to pursue undergrad slightly later on in life, and make up a greater percentage of mature students, for whatever reason. Distinctions across subjects By far the most interesting set of statistics about gender at third level, however, are the subject-based numbers. They skew far more than by either age or institution, and only a handful of subject categories come even close to gender balance. This isn’t a new revelation, nor is it particularly surprising where the imbalance lies, but it’s startling just how big the differences still are. Engineering is by far the worst offender in terms of female participation, with the sector as a whole, nationally, 85.6% male. Individual categories are better and worse in places – materials science is 96.3% male, but food processing is only 39.1%. This is consistent with what has long been reported – there is still a significant cultural taboo which discourages women from entering the field, and it is only just beginning to be dismantled. In contrast, areas of engineering which crossover with fields seen as more traditionally female, such as food and textiles, don’t have the same problem – in fact quite the opposite. The sciences are similar offenders, if not quite as bad. As a whole the area is just 37.4% female, but there are significant differences between the various branches. More maths based strands are male dominated, including physics (82.4%) and computer science (86.7%). Life sciences are more female dominated, like biology and biochemistry (60%). Chemistry hovers in the middle, at 52% female. Again, this fits with (and is caused by) stereotypes, and consistent reports from women of relatively hostile working environments in STEM careers.

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Of the 93 subjects tracked by the HEA, 65 (or 70%) have a difference of 20 percentage points or more between the genders.

generally is 70.9% female, but pre-school education is the single most unbalanced field in Ireland at a staggering 97.6% female. The health and welfare sector is similar, but interestingly medicine is almost balanced (52.1% female) while nursing is very much not (89.2%). Again, this is indicative of cultural norms – men shy away from fields seen as “feminine”, such as childcare and nursing. Damning evidence The statistics when viewed as a whole are damning. Though education as a whole is almost balanced in gender and some of the broad categories like social sciences come close, the overwhelming majority of subjects in third level show a heavy gender skew in one or other direction. Of the 93 subjects

On the opposite end of the scale are areas like education and healthcare. Education

tracked by the HEA, 65 (or 70%) have a difference of 20 percentage points or more between the genders. Efforts to dismantle stereotypes and to, for instance, encourage women to enter STEM fields are laudable and should be expanded – but in their current form they’re clearly not remotely sufficient. Though the statistics examined here obviously apply only to Ireland, there’s no reason to believe we’re any kind of unique case. This is a widespread cultural issue, as there’s no reason why anyone should immediately be more or less interested in a field because of their gender. We’re socialising women to believe they’re less suited to do maths and men to believe that entering childcare would be emasculating

and beneath them. We all need to be challenging our assumptions about such things on a daily basis. It’s bizarre and unacceptable that we’ve become so used to these massive differences and

accepted them as a fact of life. These numbers are alarming, but they’re just symptoms - symptoms of a wider societal malaise that requires immediate action from all of us.

The declining funding of Ireland’s higher education sector An analysis of where third level institutions get their funding, and how that has been decreasing over the past decade Ronan Mac Giolla Rua up 80% of the income of higher education institutes. InDepth Editor

N A WORLD THAT sees conservative values dominating, along with the rising sentiment that students should pay for their education, Irish students are, in a sense, lucky, that over 90% of us attend institutions predominantly funded by the state. Unlike students in the UK or US, for example, we are not shouldered with tens of thousands of Euro of debt even before we graduate. However, things are changing: the Cassells report proposes the introduction of student fees, or a student loan system, and while university attendance has been on the rise, state funding has been on the decline. Decline in state funding In 2008, state grants made

That has decreased every year since then, and last year, direct state grants made up just 50% of the income. The balance in funding has mainly come from the student contribution charge, which has steadily increased from €825 in 2008 to €3000 in 2016. Overall, this has led to third level colleges receiving €427m from student contributions last year, as opposed to just €91m eight years ago. At the same time, government funding has continued to fall, from €1.397bn in 2008 to €860m last year. Even taking into account the fact that roughly 50% of the student contribution is paid back by the state to grant holders, the data shows a stark decline in state funding. In 2008, government funding accounted for 78% of the funding for the core activities

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Overall, this has led to third level colleges receiving €427m from student contributions last year, as opposed to just €91m eight years ago.

of third level institutions, while in 2016 it accounted for just 64%, lower than the OECD average of 68%. This decrease in funding has been accompanied by a sharp increase in the number of students attending third level education. This has led to a sharp decline in income per student, as can be seen. With less money to go around, and less money per individual student, not only have staffto-student ratios been falling, but staff numbers generally have fallen across the board. While the number of full-time students enrolled in higher education rose by 16.66% from 2008 to 2013, the number of staff employed by the institutions they attended fell by 10%. Breakdown of income The most recent breakdown of funding for individual universities is from the 2010/11 academic year. That

year saw students directly contribute 21% of university funding through the student contribution charge (i.e., this does not include contribution charges that were paid by the state). Differences can clearly be seen between universities, as more students in Trinity, UCD, and NUIG paid the student contribution than had this charge paid by the state. Along with UCC, those three institutions received much more state funding than UL, DCU, and NUIM, mostly owing to the smaller number of students attending the latter group. Yet looking at income per student, UL, DCU, NUIM, all had lower – in some cases much lower – figures than the other universities. NUIM had the lowest income per student at €7,958, compared to the €11,129 of Trinity. How grant recipients have been affected Grant recipients have been

hit by the rising student contribution charge, as well as the 2008 recession that pushed more families into the income bracket qualifying for the grant. While student numbers have been on the rise every year since 2008, total government grant spending only rose between 2008 and 2010, before declining. Even though the government is spending more money on student grants than in 2008, the amount that individual students receive has decreased. As well as this, the types of funding students receive from the grant has changed. With the rising student contribution charge, more and more of the grant funding is allocated simply to paying this charge. In 2008, more than three-quarters of government grant funding was spent on maintenance grants, while in 2013 this figure decreased to

less than half. Even though the government spent €80,000 more on grant funding in 2013 than in 2008, this didn’t even cover the € 160,000 rise in grant funding that was spent on the student contribution charge. Even though more students are attending third level, less and less money is being spent on the maintenance grants. Conclusion Overall, the past number of years have seen decreasing funding for third level education, affecting the ability of colleges to cater to their students, and in some cases the ability of students to attend college due to decreasing grants and rising student contribution charges. With student loans and the introduction of fees on the horizon, the future does not look much brighter.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

In depth

Analysing Ireland’s high third level drop-out rates InDepth editor Peter O’Donovan takes a look at why 1 in 6 college students drop out before the end of their first year Peter O’Donovan InDepth Editor

HE NUMBER OF STUDENTS studying at Irish third level institutions has risen dramatically in the past 50 years. As can be seen from the graphs next to the article, the number of students enrolled in both universities and in institutes of technology began to rise steadily in the 70s and 80s before going into overdrive after 2005. This has lead to a situation where there are almost 10 times as many students enrolled in all third level institutions in this country overall as there were in 1965. As one of the attached bar charts shows, Ireland has the most educated population in the EU with 31.4% of the population educated to degree level. This trend indicates that post secondary education has become accessible to a much broader range of people now than it has been in the past. Though this wider accessibility is a very positive development, a recent study by the Irish Times on third level drop-out rates have indicated that it has a negative side: approximately 1 in 6 students who start a college course are likely to leave the course before the end of first year. Some courses, such as industrial physics in DIT, had less than 30% of the students who start the course progress from first year to second year in 2016. It is important to note that failing to progress to second year of a course on paper does not necessarily mean that a student dropped out of college entirely: these figures include students who changed courses, deferred or took a year out. Despite the figures being inflated by these cases, they still indicate that there is a lot of work to be done to improve student retention rates at third level. The problem is worse in institutes of technology, which have an average overall drop-out rate of 17%, than it is in universities, which have an average overall drop-out rate of 11%. The bar charts beside the article show that students in computer science are the most likely to drop out, while those in healthcare are much less likely to drop out. Engineering and humanities courses show drop out rates somewhere in the middle. The high dropout rates in computer science courses have led figures such as Mary Cleary from the Irish Computer Society to suggest that Irish students do not get enough experience with coding and other technical computer skills at secondary school level before reaching college, leaving them incapable of succeeding at third level computer courses. Deficiencies in the mathematical ability of some beginner third level

students have been implicated as a possible reason for the observed drop-out rates in computer science and other scientific course by Brian MacCraith, president of DCU, among others. If these comments are correct then an improvement in secondary level maths teaching and an introduction of computer science classes to the secondary level curriculum will be needed to increase student retention in these courses. What causes the drop outs? Outside of problems with secondary level education and the skill set students have when starting out in college, there are a couple of possible explanations for the drop out rates we are currently observing. One possible explanation is that the expansion of numbers attending third level education has led to a higher number of less academically able students being enrolled in third level. This argument says that students who would in the past not have been able to get into college due to relatively low grades in secondary school are now able to get into third level courses because the overall number of college places have expanded, then are unable to cope with the workload of third level education and so end up dropping out. There is some evidence that lack of academic ability is a factor in dropout rates. The more points someone receives in their Leaving Cert, the less likely they are to drop out, based on research by Maynooth University in 2010 which showed a direct correlation between Leaving Cert results and probability of dropping out of college. It is worth noting, however, that Leaving Cert points show a strong correlation with a person’s socio-economic status and do not necessarily reflect their overall intelligence. Those who get relatively low Leaving Cert points then drop out of college may well be dropping out due to life circumstances rather than a lack of ability or intelligence. It is important for colleges to work to find out what issues would cause students from lower earning backgrounds to leave before completing their course and to aim to improve in these areas. The problems faced by students who are less academically able or who come from lower socio-economic backgrounds are likely exacerbated by the fact that the increase in the numbers of students attending third level education has not been matched by the increase in teaching staff. This has led to worsening teacher-student ratios, from an average of 23:1 in 2009, to an average of 27:1 now. The higher the teacherstudent ratio, the less time a member of teaching staff has to devote to helping any individual student, which can lead to students who are at risk of dropping out due to having

a hard time coping with their academic workload being unable to access academic support that could have kept them in college. Poorly chosen courses The most popular reason for students to drop out, based on the Why Students Leave report published by the National Forum for Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in 2015, is that the student chose a course that did not suit them. The study found that this was cited almost four times as often as “course difficulty” as a reason why students had dropped out of their course. This indicates that there is a more frequent problem with students being poorly matched to their courses than there is with students being incapable of doing the work assigned to them. This may caused in part by students having little time and energy to research their courses in full while studying for their Leaving Cert. The recent trend towards a more general first year in college, seen in places like Maynooth University, may help ameliorate this problem by allowing students to get some first hand experience of various different college courses before deciding for certain what they want to spend their time in college studying. Frustration There is little to no benefit having people attend college courses they do not complete. In the best case scenario someone who drops out before finishing their course learns useful information and has valuable life experiences before leaving college, but even in this best case scenario they do not have a degree to put on their CV. In most cases where a person drops out their experience of college is likely to simply be frustrating and negative. Students also pay a large financial penalty if they drop out of one course then apply to another as they lose their grant entitlement for the next year by doing so. There is also a negative effect on the college, which has used up limited teaching time teaching someone who is not going to go beyond the first year or so of that course. In order avoid wasting college resources and to save students the stress and difficulty of dropping out, governments and colleges should aim to ensure that students are as well matched as possible to their courses. Secondary schools must strive to ensure that they provide their students with adequate technical skills to succeed at third level. Students also have a role to play by researching their course of study thoroughly before applying to ensure that it is really what they want to do and that they feel they will be able to get through the difficult parts of the course.

New year, new me - or not

Niall Maher analyses the data to see just how many people stick with their new year’s resolutions, and what resolutions are most likely to be completed successfully Niall Maher Contributing Writer

VERY YEAR A SIZABLE proportion of the population use the 1st of January as the starting point to make a new habit or end an old one. Using recent research from the University of Scranton, we attempt to analyse just how popular New Year’s resolutions are and if they are effective. All of the statistics used will be based on a survey of 1 562 respondents; 1,273 online, 216 phone, and 73 in-person. All of these respondents were based in the United States. There is a clear divide in the population on whether to make resolutions or not. The percentage of people who usually make New Year’s resolutions and the percentage that absolutely never do are almost the same; 41% and 42% respectively.

The remainder is made up of people who infrequently make resolutions. These people amount to 17% of the general population. A lack of success One of the most interesting aspects of the statistics is the amount of respondents who succeed in keeping their resolutions, just 9.2%. On the other hand, 42.4% of people try and fail every year to achieve their resolution, which is a somewhat depressing statistic. The largest group was the people who have infrequent success with their resolution. 48.4% of respondents make some sort of progress towards their goals but do not achieve enough to feel fully satisfied. This may be because they made multiple resolutions and only completed some of them so they cannot say that they have fully succeeded in keeping them. The statistics also gave helpful pointers towards

techniques that help you to keep your resolution. For instance, people who explicitly make resolutions are ten times more likely to keep their resolutions over people who do not make explicit commitments. This is an enormous proportional difference. So if you are having difficulties this year at keeping your resolutions and you have not explicitly stated what they are, the data suggests that that could be your problem. Writing down the resolutions somewhere you can see them regularly could a method for doing better next year or for trying again this year. The study also provided interesting insights into what the most common type of resolutions were. Self Improvement or education related resolutions came top of the list with 44.3% of people making a commitment. This broad area could consist of things such as learning a language, becoming more

organized or reading more books. If you go to the gym you may have noticed a sizably larger amount of people competing for equipment and space. This can be attributed to the second most common type of resolution and one the one that immediately springs to mind when you think of New Year’s resolutions - fitness related ones. Almost a third of the population, 32.4%, have committed to either gaining or, more commonly, losing weight in the new year. Money matters Another large proportion of the population committed to money related resolutions. 42.1% wanted to save more money or spend less on frivolous expenditure. This narrowly missed out on being the most common type of resolution (The percentage of respondents committing to resolutions is over 100% is because many of them made multiple resolutions. Unfortunately there was no

research done on how many resolutions were made on average per person). The last large type of resolution made was relationship related resolutions. Approximately one-fifth or 22.8% of people actively work on improving their relationships once 1 January comes around. The research also showed that age was a factor in how successful you are at completing your resolutions every year. 37.8% of people aged under thirty complete their resolution every year. This figure falls off dramatically as the respondents increase in age. The percentage of people over 50 who keep their resolutions every year has lessened hugely to 16.3%. An obvious cause of this decline is that the older participants have had made more new resolutions and so have more chances to fail. A final topic that the respondents answered related

to what length of time they managed to keep their resolutions for. Depressingly, only 72.6% managed to keep their resolutions for the first week. It is a rather sobering statistic that almost 30% of people failed to resist temptation for more than seven days. More optimistically, the proportion of people dropping out leveled out quickly as time went on. After two weeks, the percentage of people keeping their resolutions was 68.4%, a fall of only 4% from the previous weeks figures. This is nowhere the 27.4% that gave up in the first week. This shows that the first week is the hardest period during which to maintain your resolutions. Change for good If you have at this point managed to keep your new habit since 1 January then you are on track to keep it into the future. The trend of the dropout rate decreasing as time goes on broadly

continues into the rest of the year. 58.4% of people stick to their resolutions until February 1st, 10% fewer than those who manage to keep their resolution going for two weeks. Most importantly, 44.8% of people still maintain their resolution six months into the year. The percentage of people failing has decreased from 27.4% in the first week to 13.6% in the five months between February and the end of June. One of the most important takeaways from these statistics is that discipline in the first few weeks of January is the most important factor in keeping your new year resolutions. To a large minority of the population, January 1st is the day to make a new start and change aspects of your life that you dislike. The research from the University of Scranton gives revealing insights into the minds of people doing New Year’s resolutions and also in how to maintain them.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

SciTech Expanding the CRISPR toolbox CRISPR is a simple and precise technique of gene editing. This opens a tremendous amount of possibilities for applications in medicine and beyond.

Jack Schofield Staff Writer

HAT IS CRISPR? Biology has been outshone in recent years. History has been made in physics, with the discovery of the Higgs boson and the detection of gravitational waves. Biological research however, has failed to excite the public as it once did with Dolly the sheep or the Human Genome Project. Although they haven’t been generating headlines, biologists have been making a steady stream of incremental advances. This gradual progress fails to excite the imagination but culminates in something which does. CRISPR, clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats, a technique which enables simple and precise gene editing, is the result of such cumulative work. The power of CRISPR is bringing biology back into the limelight. CRISPR has become a sensation in biotechnology, labs around the world are embracing its use, companies are scrambling to commercialise it while others warn of ‘designer babies’. The science behind CRISPR however, has humble origins. In 1987, Japanese researcher, Yoshizumi Ishino, noticed some unusual, repeating genetic sequences in E. coli bacteria. He and his team were intrigued,stating that “the biological significance of these sequences is not known” but their investigation went no further. Six years after Ishino’s work, Francisco Mojica, from the University of Alicante, encountered the same sequences in microbes from local salt marshes during his doctoral studies. Mojica found the repeat sequences appearing in the genomes of multiple, distantly related microbes. Mojica characterised these sequences and called them Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats or CRISPR. CRISPR was later shown to be a microbial immune system; bacteria, like us, must fend off viral invaders. Microbes such as bacteria and archaea use CRISPR in nature to seek out and destroy invasive viral DNA or RNA. This initial identification of CRISPR was conventional biology, describing living systems. In 2012, however, work by Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier allowed researchers to move from describing, to engineering CRISPR. They introduced a programmable

version of CRISPR-Cas9, with which researchers could easily modify genes of their choice. In nature, CRISPR uses two RNA molecules, which bind to DNA, and guide destructive proteins to a target gene. Doudna and Charpentier streamlined this into a system using a single, guide RNA (gRNA). Once the DNA sequence of a target is known, a complementary gRNA is designed and synthesised for use in cells. This is not the first gene editing techniques, others such as the Zinc Finger Nuclease (ZFN) or TALEN systems preceded CRISPR. ZFNs and TALENs are both man-made, (ZFNs and TALENs) they are constructed by fusing different proteins together. CRISPR, by contrast, is a natural microbial system, it only needs to be tweaked for use in the lab. This makes CRISPR simpler and much cheaper to use than its predecessors. The flexibility of CRISPR allows researchers to engineer or modify genes of their choosing. CRISPR put to the test Mere months after Doudna and Charpentier’s work was published, it had been trialled successfully elsewhere and other labs began implementing CRISPR-Cas9 in their own research. Excitement around CRISPR spread quickly and the technique gained in popularity. It was soon being tested in multicellular organisms instead of the unicellular microbes in which it originated. In 2015, just three years after CRISPR’s introduction, research by Junjiu Huang and his colleagues from the Sun Yatsen University in China led to the first use of the technique in human embryonic cells. Editing of these “germ-line” cells can produce permanent genetic changes which are then inherited by future generations. These germline alterations might help to eliminate these genetic diseases from families, such as the blood disorder, beta-thalassemia, targeted by the Sun Yat-sen group. These efforts were however, ultimately unsuccessful. At the end of 2016, a team from Sichuan University, China went on to pioneer its use in human patients at the end of 2016, injecting CRISPR edited cells into a lung cancer patient to ‘switch-off’ the PD-1 gene. Cancer cells exploit PD-1, a gene which inhibits the immune response, in order to protect themselves from the body’s natural defences. CRISPR edited cells prevent cancer from hijacking PD1. A similar trial has been approved in the United States and is due to start this year.

Commercialisation A market has sprung up around CRISPR, where private companies are seeking to commercialise the technique leading to competition for the lucrative patent rights to the technology. Feng Zhang, from the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, an important figure in the initial development of CRISPR-Cas9 has featured in this legal dispute over CRISPR patenting. Doudna and Charpentier are currently involved in an enormous case with Zhang’s group. The groups are competing for the patent rights to CRISPR-Cas9, in anticipation of its medical or industrial applications in the future. Doudna and Charpentier were first to apply for the patent, but the application by Zhang’s group from the Broad went through an accelerated examination process. This expedited application led to the Broad Institute being awarded the patent, a decision to which the Berkeley group responded with a ‘patent interference’ request. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has, since January 2016, been trying to determine who are the creators of the technique and so who should hold the ‘foundational’ patent for CRISPR-Cas9. This bitter patent battle has attracted much attention, as it could have huge ramifications for the current CRISPR market. Despite the legal rancour, scientists investigating these systems may soon render this corporate clamour for CRISPR-Cas9 irrelevant: Cas9 may be superseded in the near future. It could be just the beginning, the first of many gene editing tools to be plucked from the microbial dark matter. CRISPR-Cas9 is a type of adaptive immune system found in microbes such as bacteria and archaea. It is used naturally by these microbes to remove invasive viral DNA or RNA that is engineered or reprogrammed by researchers to edit genes of their choice. The genetic landscape of the microbial world is, however, astonishingly diverse and Cas9 is by no means the only CRISPR system out there. New developments Recent work has seen the CRISPR family expanding, improving the capabilities of the gene editing tools that scientists can use. Research from the Zhang lab discovered CRISPR-Cpf1, which can be used in genomes which are not suitable for Cas9. Cpf1 may also be more efficient at inserting DNA, rather than just removing it. The Zhang lab also discovered the CRISPR-C2c2 variant,

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Although they haven’t been generating headlines, biologists have been making a steady stream of incremental advances.

which targets RNA instead of DNA. By targeting RNA, C2c2 won’t make permanent edits to the genome. This allows it to make temporary, adjustable changes to a gene, rather than permanently removing it from a cell. At the end of 2016, Jillian Banfield, a colleague of Doudna’s at UC Berkeley used metagenomics, a technique used to analyse the genomes of microbial ecosystems, instead of individual species. Using these vast datasets is more complex than other methods, but makes a discovery more likely. Metagenomics is useful for uncultivated microbes, organisms which are difficult to grow in culture in the lab. Banfield studied the genomes of exotic microbes, living in toxic water or underground geysers. From these unlikely sources, she uncovered new CRISPR systems, such as CasX and CasY which are minimalistic, more compact than Cas9. It could, therefore, be easier to incorporate them into cells in the lab. Following the publication of Banfield’s research, work led by Benjamin Rauch from UC San Francisco introduced yet another tool to the CRISPR toolbox, inhibitory ‘off-switch’ proteins. They sifted through the genomes of Listeria bacteria and found ‘AcrIIA’ proteins with which to counteract DNA degradation by CRISPR. Such ‘antiCRISPR’ proteins are used by bacteria to minimise the risk of destroying their own genes rather than the viruses they are targeting. These new AcrIIA proteins could be used in research to reduce ‘offtarget’ effects in gene editing. Unwanted modifications plagued the unsuccessful

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A gradual accumulation of discoveries, each of which appear small on its own, will culminate in a powerful gene editing suite.

editing of embryonic cells at Sun Yat-sen University, for example. AcrIIA proteins could help researchers to alter specific genes, without damaging other genes in the process, fine-tuning the control of CRISPR. These discoveries are interesting but, in isolation, are not quite revolutionary. As more and more CRISPR systems are discovered however, they begin to compose a comprehensive toolbox. A gradual accumulation of discoveries, each of which appears small on its own, will culminate in a powerful gene editing collection. Already, research has yielded CRISPR systems which are big or small, which cut or insert genes, which make temporary or permanent changes, along with an essential off-switch. These initial searches for CRISPR systems are not exhaustive, there are almost certainly other versions tucked away in the genetic tree of life. We have a small selection now which could expand into a comprehensive, general purpose toolbox in the future. Biotechnology companies pouncing on the patents for biological processes may seem worrying. Science can however move faster than these organisations. The tree of life has plenty of genetic tricks waiting to be found. With so much discovered in such a short time, there is reason to be optimistic. The initial development of programmable CRISPR was a gradual process that eventually paid off. The platform has been established, the science is just getting started.

Wonders of nanotechnology & material science Aoife describes the origins of nanotechnology and material science and discusses their potential applications in medicine and agriculture. Aoife Louise Gorman Staff Writer

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S SOON AS I mention this, people tell me about miniaturization, and how far it has progressed today. They tell me about electric motors that are the size of the nail on your small finger. And there is a device on the market, they tell me, by which you can write the Lord’s Prayer on the head of a pin. But that’s nothing; that’s the most primitive, halting step in the direction I intend to discuss. It is a staggeringly small world that is below. In the year 2000, when they look back at this age, they will wonder why it was not until the year 1960 that anybody began seriously to move in this direction.” Richard Feynman, “There’s plenty of room at the bottom”-1959 In 1959, Professor Richard Feynman delivered a lecture to the annual meeting of the American Physical Society at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) where he described the possibilities of nanotechnology, a term that would not appear in scientific literature for another 15 years. The birth of nanotechnology R e m a r k a b l y , nanotechnology was not a twenty-first century discovery

and surprisingly dates back much further than Feynman’s famous 1959 lecture. Strong evidence of nanostructured materials by skilled craftsmen who understood the effect of heat on certain materials dates as early as the fourth century. About 1,600 years ago, the Lycurgus Cup was probably believed to possess magical properties. In the presence of an external light source, the Roman chalice appears opaque green, but changes dramatically to translucent red when the light shines from within. This is not due to the casting of a Colvera charm or any other Harry Potter magic but rather is a perfect example of the technical skills possessed by early Roman artisans who engineered dichroic material by mixing glass with 50nm (a nanometer is 1 millionth of a millimeter!) colloidal gold and silver nanoparticles. In 1974, Professor Norio Taniguchi of Tokyo Science University first coined the term nanotechnology describing the “precision machining of materials to within atomic scale dimensional tolerances.” Nanotechnology and material sciences were then officially born. Over the last 50 years this field has advanced rapidly to what seems like nearly science fictional heights.

From nanoparticle-eating worms to robotic skin capable of sensing the world around us, here’s a look at what this flourishing field of science fact has in store for us. Nanotechnology in Medicine and Agriculture Nanoparticles have made headlines in recent years as tiny, but crucial, players in modern medicine — proving my mum was right when she told me the best things come in small packages — and boy do they pack a punch! Clinical applications using nanoparticles range from vaccines and drug carriers to gene delivery vehicles. Even contrast agents used for radiology imaging are comprised of nanoparticles. However, two research labs in Stanford University have taken Nanomedicine to a whole new level of weird and wonderful. The groups, lead by Professors Jennifer Dionne & Miriam Goodman, research tiny worms which though small in size have the very long Latin name Caenorhabditis elegans or C.elegans for short. This transparent nematode is approximately 1mm in length and normally lives in temperate soil environments. In this BioX seed grant study, however, the worms spend their day munching on nanoparticles encapsulating

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In this BioX seed grant study, however, the worms spend their day munching on nanoparticles encapsulating their favourite bacterial snack.

their favourite bacterial snack. When excited by a nearinfrared laser, the inorganic nanoparticles emit light of different colours depending on the environmental pressures surrounding them. This allows the particles to release real-time data relevant to the particular forces they are undergoing while inside the worms. This research is particularly useful for understanding the role of tissue force generation. According to Professor Dionne, “altered cellular-level forces underlie many disorders including heart disease and cancer.” By accurately detecting cellular forces within our own bodies at an early stage we could treat and potentially prevent certain diseases thanks to the pioneering research carried out in these tiny worms. Speaking of earthworms, a research team in The University of Queensland has recently discovered an environmentally sustainable pesticide to protect plants from pathogenic viruses that could prove to be an invaluable addition to current crop protection measures. BioClay, is a sophisticated nanomaterial produced by loading double-stranded RNA which induces virus resistance in plants onto layered double hydroxide (LDH) clay

nanosheets. The dsRNA loaded onto this clay “face mask” for plants tricks it into thinking it is under attack and prompts a protective response against future infections. LDH is non-toxic, degradable, and can be sprayed directly onto plant leaves and is detected up to 20 days after a single spray! The majority of breakthroughs in nanotechnology and material science occur in healthcare and agriculture which, let’s be fair, are pretty important sectors of society to apply our expanding knowledge of this field. But, if you’ve recently watched Westworld, HBO’s new series set in a wild west theme park inhabited by disturbingly life-like robots, you’ve probably wondered how close we actually are to creating such realistic automatons. The scary or perhaps exciting answer, depending on your point of view, is pretty close. Nanotechnology and “smart skin” Last year Professor Haixia Zhang and her research group from Peking University in Beijing published a paper in ACS Nano on “smart skin technology”. This is a synthetic, self-powered skin that has the potential to enable robots to physically sense the world around

them. This transparent skin detects contact location and velocity of the object it is sensing resolves many of the previous problems associated with other prototypes that required many powersupplying electrodes to boost sensitivity and precision. This superior smart skin requires just four electrodes (others require up to 36) comprised of silver nanowires and, amazingly, can also harvest mechanical energy and convert it to an electrical current. Microstructured poly films allow this technology to be merged onto human skin for use in prosthetics. When tested in the lab, the smart skin was capable of sensing a honey bee flying towards it! These advances have the potential to incorporate a high level of flexibility and sensitivity into prosthetics, but also may give a new “life” to a generation of androids that are capable of sensing the environment around them. From dichroic chalices developed centuries ago to robotic smart skin that can “feel” the world around it, nanotechnology has come a long way. Richard Feynman predicted the future of an unnamed field of science during his 1959 lecture in which he imagined a nanoworld filled with endless possibilities.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Sport Health and Wellbeing

Blood, sweat and fears: the P word Research into female athletes’ health raises awareness and questions concerning the often unacknowledged and ‘taboo’ topic in women’s sport - the menstrual cycle. Clare McCarthy Sports Editor

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E CONDUCTED A SURVEY and we found that 55% of elite level athletes say that their menstrual cycle affects their training and performance,” explains Georgie Bruinvels, PhD student at St Mary’s and UCL. Bruinvels is currently researching iron metabolism in endurance athletes, particularly focusing on female health and the menstrual cycle. Her studies with UCL are among the first to investigate the many ways in which menstruation might affect competition and training for female athletes. “A third of all elite level athletes have heavy menstrual bleeding which is really significant because in research, everything is dominated by the female athlete triad, [a syndrome of three interrelated conditions including; energy deficiency, amenorrhea (absence of menstruation), and decreased bone mineral density].” While conducting the research, Bruinvels realised that the menstrual cycle just isn’t spoken about in relation to athletes. As a result, the ‘taboo’ subject was either left unacknowledged by researchers, or the research conducted only targeted women at specific phases during their cycle. Some research trials were only conducted on men as the massive complexities and varieties in women’s individual hormone levels made trials complex and expensive. “The easiest, [and cheapest] situation is to either; test women who are on the pill - which is very common, or to only test women who are in certain stages of their menstrual cycle. So, it’s effectively preventing showing that variation which is anticipated.” “It’s become a big passion of mine,” says Bruinvels. “I am fascinated by the whole thing and I want to delve deeper

and understand better what’s going on and advance female physiology research in a male dominated world.” Research into female physiology “Around the time of the First and Second World War, it was perceived that they shouldn’t test women due to potential harm to unborn foetuses and also that women and men were the same and that they should categorise them as the same.” Sports science has advanced hugely since then, accompanied by the acknowledgment that there can be gender-specific influences on an athlete’s performance. “However, by then it was too late and people always want to progress research forward and not go back and repeat everything and now we are kind of stuck in this situation,” says Bruinvels. Bruinvels’ plan for her research is to develop it further and gain a better understanding of the menstrual cycle, it’s effects on performance and how to negate them. “Strength varies through the menstrual cycle, typically it’s suggested that what you should eat varies through the menstrual cycle, injury risk varies through the menstrual cycle, so many different things vary and it’s a question of manipulating them, potentially, to optimise performance.” Athletes and their experiences Speaking to some female athletes first hand about how their cycle affects them, confirmed what Bruinvels and her research were saying. “It one hundred percent affects my training,” said one athlete. “Without a doubt one day a month, at least, my legs get very heavy. I’ve heard that from a few other girls that their legs get really heavy and you just don’t feel good.” “I’m training 60 miles a week, that’s about 8-10 miles

a day and that’s very testing on your body as it is without having that on top. I dread it, to be honest.” Another athlete echoed her statement. “I do, definitely notice an effect coming up to my period and the days I’m on my period. I’m bloated, my legs feel tired and I just want to eat chocolate which is not great before races!” “I just don’t feel great. It definitely has an effect on how I run, because if you’re not feeling good, you don’t run very well.” Alongside the physical effects of the menstrual cycle, athletes found the psychological side of their sport affected by menstruation or PMS. “I would find that PMS affects me. My mood is down on the first or second day of menstruation and I just don’t feel in the mood for my training schedule. Although, I would never not train if I’m on my period. You don’t give yourself the excuse of it but I still feel sorry for myself after a bad session.” A common concern between athletes is the gear worn while competing being incompatible with menstruation. “A lot of people don’t consider that when you’re racing you usually have to wear short shorts and if you have heavy bleeding you would be worried you might leak. That was a problem that affected me because my periods used to be quite heavy. “It’s just an extra stress on your mind,” reiterated a second athlete. “I definitely find my confidence would drop a lot when I have my period when running or racing because I’m really anxious about what I’m wearing and getting to the bathroom. I usually wear these small blue racing shorts but I won’t wear them if I’m on my period.” The contraceptive pill can be used by athletes who wish to track their cycle and strategically plan to avoid menstruation on competition days. “A lot of female athletes go on the pill to regulate their

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It’s all well and good me saying yes, it should be spoken about but when I bring that back to my daily life as an athlete I don’t like the idea of being excused in comparison to the men.

period,” says one athlete. “I was on the pill for my skin, but as an athlete I was also able to track when my period was due. If I had a race, I knew what to expect and could take precautions.” But while it accommodates practicalities, for an athlete who is training at top level, all of the time, the days of menstruation will still inevitably have an effect on their training. “They say there’s a lot of things you can do to regulate it, help it, and that but I don’t know if I would necessarily agree with that. Yes, you can go on the pill. Yes, you can try working your training or races around it but at the end of the day when you’re on the pill, you still get a period, you still get cramps, and you still feel worse,” says one track and field athlete. “It’s very unpredictable, every month is different, sometimes it affects you, sometimes it doesn’t.” The pill can regulate menstruation, but that’s just one aspect of the menstrual cycle. For an athlete, hormone levels, mood and it’s dreaded unpredictability can all have an effect on performance. Wrestling with language - the taboo of the word ‘taboo’ “It’s not something that’s regularly discussed,” says Bruinvels, “In doing my research, I’ve realised that actually, the menstrual cycle isn’t spoken about, there’s very little research in it.” And when the result of speaking about it is enough to make you go viral, it’s little wonder why it’s not regularly spoken about. When a Chinese swimmer, Fu Yuanhui, produced a less-than-best performance in the 4x100m relay in the Rio Olympics, the resulting post-race interview caught the world’s attention, all for the love of the word ‘period’. The New York Times headline read: ‘Uninhibited Chinese Swimmer, Discussing Her Period, Shatters Another Barrier.’

They were right, it is considered one of the last taboos in sport. But when it comes to athletes dissecting their performances, leg cramps, injuries, sleep patterns etc. are all discussed in great detail both on and off screen. A period cramp, although exclusive to female athletes, should be no less abnormal to discuss than a leg cramp due to lactic acid if both hinder good performance. “I think that’s a massive issue because – almost by saying the word ‘taboo,’ creates a taboo,” says Bruinvels, addressing the heart of the issue. “It’s getting people to feel that it’s a healthy thing. It is the most natural thing. We need to perpetuate that that is the case and not to overdramatize it.” On a personal level for an athlete, it’s even more complex than a social ‘taboo’ that deters athletes from discussing it. An athlete’s attitude is crucial to success in their sport, they are used to pain and pushing through tough sessions. That’s the nature of sport. And part of this attitude is an unwillingness for excuses, including menstruation. “I train with a lot of boys so it’s never really spoken about,” says one athlete. “I don’t like to set men and women apart and because I am training with the lads I want to believe that I can train with them, no excuses.” “I don’t want to make excuses for myself or put myself in a mindset where I say, I’m not going to do well today because I have this. But then sometimes you do end up feeling sorry for yourself.” This leaves female athletes in no-man’s land. Talk about it and ‘break the taboo’ and go viral. Or talk about it and risk bad performance by stepping out of the psychological ‘zone.’ And so, it remains a largely unacknowledged aspect of sport. But even if they were to talk about it, athletes are unsure how to address it. “It should be normalized

but I don’t know how we go about talking about it, though? Maybe we should just be targeting female athletes,” suggests one athlete. “You could take a wellknown female sports figure, like Jessica Ennis-Hill, for example, a real athlete who girls look up to and for her to speak out and say it’s normal, and how it affects her. That could encourage more open conversation.” For Bruinvels, it is important to get people talking about it in order to drive research forward and find solutions to gender-specific athlete concerns. “We need to get people to understand that it’s normal and to also, drive research forward. It’s all very well acknowledging that there are different variations and people suffer but we’ve actually got to do something about it.” Research, or lack thereof, seems to be the crux of this issue. Sport is about winning, and performing to the best of your ability. “As an athlete, it affects your life more than it does a normal person,” acknowledges one athlete. “Most people don’t have to address it. Whereas, as an athlete you probably do have to address it but you don’t want to feel that you’re different.” This is the paradox presented to female athletes. Until research is advanced enough to offer solutions to the effects the menstrual cycle has on an athlete’s performance, open discussion on this topic will be considered ‘taboo’ and female athletes will, understandably, refrain from talking about it. “It’s all well and good me saying, ‘Yes, it should be spoken about,’ but when I bring that back to my daily life as an athlete I don’t like the idea of being excused in comparison to the men. But that’s a lose-lose situation, because it can and does affect my training.”

Talking about fight club DU Boxing Club captains Aisling Anderson and Pierce Cleary talk teamwork, women’s boxing and getting into the ring Dáire O’Driscoll Deputy Sports Editor

E’S A SOUTHPAW AND I hadn’t copped it”, he says as he pushes his chair back from the table, the better to demonstrate the finer points of boxing. Pierce Cleary exudes love for the sport. It’s evident to all as he explains how it’s often hard to think clearly in the ring. He extends his right fist forward over the table and throws a jab fading to one side as his hand moves. It seems odd that Cleary didn’t start boxing until he was 17 such is his knowledge of the sport. Whether listening to him analysing Carl Frampton’s victory against Scott Quigg in February 2016 or explaining the virtues of Andy Lee, one can’t help but be interested in boxing too. “I couldn’t get a medical clearance until I was 17, I have a heart condition”, he explained. The maths student from Tipperary had only been boxing just over a year when he signed up to DU Boxing Club. Cleary cuts a different figure to his co-captain, Aisling Anderson. After trying a number of sports during her undergraduate years, she found her way to the boxing gym. Now in her first year as a doctoral student, Aisling said she made the decision to join the boxing club out of curiosity, attracted by its popularity and as a way to keep fit. “I knew it was good for fitness. So I joined for

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“Some people get punched in the face once and won’t come back, some people just get a feel for it. It’s perfectly normal not to want to get punched in the face”

fitness only but ended up in the ring”. While Cleary had always wanted to box, it was an interest that came to Anderson unexpectedly which, as they explain, represents the Club quite well.

you’re sparring with you get along with quite well. In team sports you might blame a lad for holding you back but when you’re in sparring with someone, the other people are always bringing you on”.

The club boasts a diverse demographic, from junior freshmen to lecturers and continually increasing number of women. Each have their own reasons for joining the club, whether always having wanted to fight, like Cleary, or just wishing to keep fit, like Anderson. The diversity within the club is explained by the perception that boxing is less “mainstream” than other sports. “The reasons people join are different. You’re going to have a huge mix of people” says Anderson. However once she had slipped between the ropes and into the ring, she found a space she very much enjoyed. “It’s a bit of an adrenaline rush. It’s kind of enjoyable getting all your frustration out on someone else. Some people get punched in the face once and won’t come back, some people just get a feel for it. It’s perfectly normal not to want to get punched in the face”.

Team integration and expansion has been accelerated by the club’s relocation last year. The demolition of Luce Hall meant that the CLub would have to be housed elsewhere for their sparring sessions. They found their home in Trinity Technology and Enterprise Centre (TTEC) at Grand Canal Dock. “We used to have our fitness sessions for an hour in the Sports Centre and our sparring would be in a different gym. You’d automatically lose the majority of people because people who come down for fitness are not going to walk to another gym to do sparring unless they already decided they were doing it” says Anderson. Proximity to the ring means more people are willing to put on a pair of gloves and try their hand at sparring. The skills of the boxers have increased along with the new facilities and new equipment. Cleary points to this as a tie that binds the diverse club.“With the bags and mirrors you’d have beginners shadow boxing and hitting bags. Some of the more senior boxers can go and tell them little things to improve”.

“It’s a not a team sport; but we still have a team” says Anderson, “there’s a strong sense of team atmosphere. It’s a very supportive club”. The ethos of the club is helping one another. Whether club mates are training or sparring they’re keen to bring each other along. This is something that sets the Boxing Club apart from other sports believes Cleary. “The people

One thing both captains noted was that the increasing numbers of women wishing to get in the ring. “I think there’s more women getting

in the ring because of people like Katie Taylor and Ronda Rousey, but I think the standard would be as good if we had those numbers” says Anderson who named the Venus and Serena Williams as her sporting heroes. “What they’ve done for women’s sport is insane”. When asked what her legacy in the club would be, it was also the issue women. At present, points for women’s fights are not counted when determining the winner of the annual intervarsity tournament. “It’s effectively an issue between the coaches. It’s outside the students themselves. There’s no real reason for it. It’s coaches being set in their ways and not really feeling that there’s any need to do it. One coach is always reluctant to add in women’s points as it might mean their team would lose. We would have won varsities had they counted the girls points last year.” Cleary, who is unequivocally in favour of Anderson’s campaign, voiced his support for equal treatment. “They’ll either have to count the points or have a separate varsities for women.” He believes the counting of women’s points would keep people in the ring.

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“Don’t think everyone is looking at you as if you don’t know what you’re doing. No one knows what they’re doing when they start. We’ve all been there”

Spurred by another well known Irish sportsman, the rise of thoseinterested in mixed martial arts (MMA) has driven up numbers in the boxing gym. This phenomenon was something that surprise to Cleary, “At the club at home, nobody even mentions MMA but at Trinity a lot of lads are coming down asking for help with it”. For those thinking of joining, the advice from Cleary is simple. “Don’t get discouraged. Keep coming down. Make as many nights a week as you can”. To prove his point he returned to his well of boxing knowledge. “One of the greatest ever was Roy Jones Jr. People used to say he was the most naturally talented boxer but he was running miles and sparring older guys with his hand tied behind his back. He said it was day in day out hard work”. The nature of university sports means that most members are not there for long. Anderson says that this means senior members are understanding; “Don’t think everyone is looking at you as if you don’t know what you’re doing. No one knows what they’re doing when they start. We’ve all been there”.

Trinity News | Tuesday 24th January

Sport

24 Talking about fight club: interview with DU Boxing Club captains page .23

Build That Wall! - and make the Provost pay for it DU Climbing Club’s newest member, Emma Dooney, channels her inner spider monkey to climb to new heights - but will she make it to the top? Emma Dooney Contributing Writer

OR ALL OF DUBLIN’S housing problems, it has always accommodated my fear of heights. The highest peak I typically reach is the fifth floor of the Arts Block and, even then, the view isn’t exactly what one would call dizzying. I like to think of myself as a down-to-earth person, meaning I stay as close to the ground as physically possible. My logic is that were we designed to fly, we wouldn’t need Red Bull to give us wings. Just as birds dominate the sky and fish thrive in the sea, we belong on the land. Of course, this sentiment is not shared by everyone. The popularity of sports like skydiving and bungee jumping reveals that my disdain for all things high is no longer socially acceptable. Thankfully, I have friends to beat this uncool trait out of me, by dragging me along to my idea of misery: rock climbing. High Hopes One might ask, “If you don’t like it, why go?”. It’s a fair question. My initial response was to refuse but then I thought to myself, “Wouldn’t it be nice to sit on the upper saloon of a bus without feeling nauseous?” Surely, if I could tackle an 11m high climbing wall, I could take on anything. And so, with The Sound of Music’s Climb Every Mountain playing sweetly in my head, I set off on my new adventure. We arrived at DU Climbing Club’s (DUCC) training on Thursday evening to find a room full of activities, ranging from scaling concave walls and skipping to chatting and laughing. While I was slightly disappointed to discover that the soundtrack wasn’t climbing themed — think of the possibilities — it wasn’t enough to dampen my spirits. Despite its name, the club’s members were anything but stoney-faced. High from the thrill of climbing, they were more than happy to help out a novice like myself. The captain, George, immediately stepped in to show me the ropes. I gawked at the

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I like to think of myself as a down-toearth person, meaning I stay as close to the ground as physically possible

ominous wall towering above me. Stippled with scraggy rocks and arbitrarily sloped, it screamed danger and pain. Suddenly realizing that ‘wall’ was only one little letter away from ‘fall’, I insisted my friend have a crack at it before me. To see her confidently embrace the challenge and effortlessly scale her way to the top quickly relieved my concerns. I decided I was ready to confront my fear. My first attempt was undeniably a bit rocky. I was only a few feet off the ground when my own feet froze. I made the rookie mistake of looking down and instantly panicked. The encouraging shouts of my peers fell dead on my ears, and I pleaded to be returned to my natural habitat. I squeezed my eyes shut as I relinquished the crutch of the rocks and ascended into midair. Needless to say, I certainly didn’t feel like I was flying à la Rose in Titanic. As I was lowered, so did my mood. I felt frustrated and angry with myself for succumbing to my irrational fear. Had my chances of becoming a real-life rock star crumbled forever? I watched enviously as my peers valiantly soared to the summit and gracefully floated back down, beginning to fret was there something legitimately wrong with me. I was the lone donkey amongst a troop of monkeys. I briefly considered fleeing the scene and finding refuge in a nearby bungalow, but I knew I had to give it another shot. After all, just because the first pancake fails, doesn’t mean you throw out the entire batch. The view from above Infused with a refreshing dose of motivation, I buckled down (or should I say, buckled up?) and launched into my second round of climbing. I promised myself that this time, I would keep my eyes bolted to the wall. The rocks are colour-coded according to their level of difficulty, but I didn’t discriminate and gave each one some love. The poor pink ones are otherwise particularly neglected – that’s

“

Suddenly realizing that ‘wall’ was only one, little letter away from ‘fall’, I insisted my friend have a crack at it before me. Seeing her confidently embrace the challenge and effortlessly scale her way to the top quickly relieved my concerns. I decided I was ready to confront my fear

patriarchy for you. My posse of supporters offered me tips and tricks for defying the obstacles along the way, cheering wildly with every step closer to the ceiling. When their cries faded and I found myself hearing only an unintelligible murmur, I worried they had abruptly lost faith in my potential. Was the whole of the climbing club staring at me in bemusement, wondering who allowed this peasant to infiltrate their kingdom. I peered down, expecting to see a mob of snickering spectators. You can only imagine my alarm when I saw that my audience had shrunk to the size of coffee beans. I realised I had reached twice the height of my first endeavor. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t frightened – my fear that a disgruntled foe would cut the rope never truly subsided. However, this anxiety was peppered with flecks of empowerment. As someone who is accustomed to life on the downlow, it was invigorating to experience the rush of such altitude. My feelings of inferiority dwindled as I let go of my identity as a lowly minion. I was finally on top of the world. Of course, rock climbing is not just for those wishing to combat crippling fears. Like a breakfast buffet, it offers something for everyone. Many people may be surprised to learn it makes for one seriously uplifting date. I have affectionately christened it the “New and Improved Bowling”. It’s really the same thing but instead of hauling a ball, you’re crawling a wall. You even get your own pair of climbing shoes, which look like the child of a Sketcher and a ballet flat. In other words, adorable. On a less peppy note, it also happens to be a brilliant way to passiveaggressively vent pent-up anger towards a loved one. Simply allowing the rope to slacken will send your partner plummeting, establishing once and for all who’s boss in your relationship. This childish method, while best used sparingly, is sure to get a

rise out of them.

“

Needless to say, I certainly didn’t feel like I was flying, à la Rose in Titanic. As I was lowered, so did my mood. I felt frustrated and angry with myself for succumbing to my irrational fear. Had my chances of becoming a real-life rockstar crumbled forever?

Tips, tricks and Tinder pics And in the age where literally nothing matters as much as your image on social media, it’s the ideal opportunity for a sparkling new profile picture. Let your Facebook chums know that there’s no cooler way to get high these days than clambering up colossal walls while bound to an incredibly flattering harness. You heard it here first: duck faces are out, chimpanzee poses are in. Angle the shot from below and nobody will ever know you’re less than three inches from the floor; it’s guaranteed to have your ‘likes’ climbing into the hundreds. This idea also works a treat on Tinder, setting you apart from the endless gallery of selfies, puppies and babies. It presents you as a strong, adventurous individual: somebody who’s tired of measly pebbles and ready for that one special rock. It’s advisable to avoid ever actually going rock climbing with your newfound beau though, as the façade is sure to be broken. All in all, I’m so glad my friend roped me into this activity. It was high time I challenged my fear. I may not have reached the very top but, in my mind, I may as well have climbed Mount Everest. And if I’m very ever feeling exceptionally masochistic, I can re-live the anxiety in an outdoor setting. The club members let me know that the fun isn’t confined to the cushy realm of the sports hall; they often venture into the wilderness of Bray and the Burren to really apply their skills. So, if you’ve fantasized about re-enacting that famous scene from Twilight then you know what to do, spider monkey. The best part is prices are anything but steep – a year-long membership will set you back a mere five euro. This experience taught me a number of things, primarily that there’s nothing scary about walls. Unless you’re a Mexican living in the United States, that is.

Credit where credit is due Full list of Trinity Sport Scholars 2016-2017 The Trinity Sports Scholarship Awards, took place in the Dining Hall on Thursday 19th January, an evening of recognition for Trinity’s best sportsmen and women.

Athletics

Hurling

Rugby (continued)

Deirdre Haren

Darragh O Donoghue Eoghan McNamara

Jack Boland Jack McDermott James Hickey Joe Horan John McKeown Michael Courtney Michael Silvester Niall O’Riordan Patrick Finlay Pierce Dargan Raef Tyrell Roghan McMahon Sam Pim Seb Fromm Tom Collis Tom Whittle

Badminton Prakash Vijayanath

Kayak Slalom/ Canoe Slalom Cade Ryan

Griffin Hansen

Basketball

Contributing Writer

Aoife O’Hallorane

Ladies Gaelic Football

Camogie Sarah Creagh

Áine Haberlin Aisling Reynolds Michelle Peel

Cricket

Pistol Shooting

Lorcan Tucker

Victoria Mullin

Eventing/Modern Pentathlon

Rowing

Eva Melly

Patrick Moreau Liam Hawkes Lauren Mc Hugh Sarah Higgins Hannah McCarthy

HE AWARD OF THE Trinity Sports Scholarship took place in the Dining Hall last Thursday evening, recognising some of the hardest-working and most talented sportspeople the college has to offer. The 66 sports scholarship recipients, family members and coaches filled the dining hall in what was an excellent evening, with excitement and enthusiasm surrounding the event. The first part of the evening was taken up by College Communications staff taking pictures of each of the athletes, dressed the part in respective club or college kit. Trinity Sport were very active on social media on the night, as they filled Twitter and Snapchat with images of the athletes enjoying the awards. Following the photos, the scholars and others in attendance were welcomed into the hall itself for the awards ceremony. The hall was wonderfully decorated, and, with the exceptional food and wine to indulge in, there was a fine ambiance as those present milled about chatting for about an hour before being seated for the ceremony. Matthew Dossett, College’s deputy head of sport, kicked off the hosting duties for the formal portion of the evening, before welcoming Michelle Tanner, head of

sport, onto the stage. Tanner’s spoke mostly of praise for the recipients of the scholarships, her appreciation of their hard work and how well they represented the college, and acknowledgement of the selfdiscipline and motivation required to reach the level of performance expected of a sports scholar. Heather McArdle, Manager of Bank of Ireland’s College branch,afterwards gave a speech of similar praise and appreciation. There as the representative of Trinity Sport’s primary sponsor, McArdle is a prominent athlete in her own right, and offered an insider’s perspective on the work required to maintain one’s high standards. Dossett then invited each recipient to the podium to receive a customised sports scholar t-shirt in recognition of their achievements, in conjunction with the recipients of the Trevor West Scholarship. This particular scholarship is awarded to several students for their outstanding contributions to sport in the college, both in their performance and their work for promotion of sport in college and is in memory of Trinity sporting legend Timothy Trevor West, who died in 2012. The t-shirts were presented individually on stage by Tanner

and McArdle, and after each recipient was photographed showing off their printed name on the t-shirt. Despite a few typos, this was marked by much applause and was followed by the guest speaker, Moira O’Brien. O’Brien is a leading figure in osteoporosis treatment and was medical officer to the Irish Olympic Team at the Moscow, Los Angeles and Seoul Olympics, having been extremely involved in sport during her many years working in College. O’Brien spoke insightfully, offering advice to the athletes in attendance and placing emphasis on the particulars required for success. O’Brien acknowledged the fantastic work done by College in providing resources for the each recipient to achieve the greatest level of performance at their sport. The evening was wrapped up by Tanner who wished to express her gratitude to all those in attendance, as well as those who work so hard to provide for the college and its athletes. This marked the end of the ceremony and the crowd dispersed to enjoy the last of the refreshment and to pose for a final few photographs before the hall emptied. It was another year of the sports scholarships awards, an exceptional evening for the college, and a well-earned night of recognition for some of College’s top sportspeople.

Fencing Phillip Cripwell Gaelic Football Cian O’Donoghue Dara O’Shea Handball Ciara Mahon Hockey Cliona McCullagh Ailish Long William (Matthew) Lee Ellie Noone Jenny Long Niamh Sweeney

Rugby 7s Fiona Tuite Sailing Sean Donnelly

Rugby Kathryn Ann Dane Niamh Byrne Colm Hogan Jack Kelly Billy O’Hora Brian Slater Cian O’Dwyer Cormac Blake Dan Joyce Darragh Higgins Daryl Egan Dave Duggan Davis St Ledger Dermot O’Flynn Fintan Murphy

Squash Tamaki Marumo Swimming Aisling Bridget Haughey Taekwondo Ellen Ince Tennis Michael Clarkson Triathlon Niall McVeigh