The University Times Volume 2 Issue 2

TRINITY’S “FINANCIAL BREAKING POINT” Barra Roantree interviews the Vice-Provost on p3

The Drugs Survey Half of us take drugs.

We talk to users and abusers on p5

FILTHY HIPSTERS SOCIAL NETWORK REVIEW TWO DOOR CINEMA CLUB INTERVIEW

The University Times Irish Student Newspaper of the Year TUESDAY, 19 OCTOBER 2010

facebook.com/universitytimes

www.universitytimes.ie

Unqualified lecturers on the rise

27 promoted academics to get back pay

Rónán Burtenshaw Deputy News Editor

College circumvents HEA moratorium on promotions as friction intensifies between the two bodies over staff reductions Tom Lowe Editor The University Times has learnt that the 27 senior academics controversially promoted during the public sector promotions embargo will receive back-pay at their new higher pay grade.

The Employment Control Framework issued by the government in 2008 to reduce staff numbers in the public service prohibits recruitment and promotions except in special approved circumstances.

The College claims the promotions process for the relevant staff commenced before the embargo came into force and so are not subject to the government moratorium.

The Irish Times reported in July of this year that the promotions would be in name only.

However, in a memo obtained

by the University Times, the Vice-Provost Patrick Prendergast wrote that the College “would propose to credit the individuals with the time spent on the higher grade”.

When asked if this was in contravention of the Employment Control Framework a Higher Education Authority spokesperson said that their “primary concern was that institutions meet reduction in staff numbers of around 6%” agreed with the Departments of Education and Finance.

That the senior academics will receive back-payments for the time spent at the higher pay grade is sure to provoke the ire of the Department of Education, who were reported to be investigating potential breaches of the embargo.

The college did not respond to a request for comment.

A member of the Capoeira Society impresses onlookers during Freshers’ Week. Photo: Dargan Crowley-Long

The Promoted: The twenty-seven academics to receive the pay bump Personal Chair Professor S O’Mara (Psychology) Professor C O’Sullivan (Computer Science and Statistics) Professor J Parnell (Natural Sciences) Associate Professor Dr D Coghlan (Business Studies) Dr S Connon (Chemistry) Dr T Connor (Medicine) Dr A Corvin (Medicine) Dr S Duffy (Histories and Humanities) Dr I Rozas (Chemistry) Dr J Wickham (Social Sciences and Philosophy) Senior Lecturer Dr P Carmody (Natural Sciences)

Dr S Frolov (Mathematics) Dr P Gallagher (Physics) Dr P Geoghegan(Histories and Humanities) Dr C Gobl (Linguistic, Speech and Communication Sciences) Dr A Harkin (Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences) Dr E Heffernan (Law) Dr J Lalor (Nursing and Midwifery) Dr L Leeson (Linguistic, Speech and Communication Sciences) Dr A McLysaght (Genetics and Microbiology) Dr B O’Kelly (Engineering) Dr M Ó Siochrú (Histories and Humanities) Dr F O’Toole (Social Sciences and Philosophy) Dr J Stout (Natural Sciences) Dr S Tresize (Drama, Film and Music) Dr V Timonen (Social Work and Social Policy) Dr S Waldren (Natural Sciences)

Lack of student representation causes ire at DUCAC AGM

Registration fee to double - Ó Broin

Leanna Byrne Staff Reporter

Ronan Costello News Editor

Members of Trinity College’s sports clubs voiced their concern over lack of student representation on committees and other decision-making processes in the Sports Department’s annual AGM last Thursday.

Trinity’s athletes questioned the decision making process on important issues such as the allocation of funds that the Sports Department currently has in place. Although the Acting Head of the Sports Department, Michelle Tanner, argued that students have a central role in committees this was not acceptable to the members.

Eoin Blaney, member of the DU Sailing Club, claimed that the Sports Department “only report on what has been done” and that there should be a formal representation system in place for Club Representatives.

Another point that Brady made about the final decision not being consulted with the students was met with a simple retort from Tanner, saying “We’re the hired professionals. Do students go to the health centre and tell the doctor how to treat his patients?”

Students’ Union President Nikolai Trigoub-Rotnem also inquired about the level of involvement that students have on these committees, saying that “no concrete decisions” are ever made when students are present or that “decisions have already been made for

them”. Nikolai continued to remind the members of the committee that students’ €77 paid annually to the Sports Department to fund sports facilities should be represented officially.

The Students’ Union President has a seat on the Sport Department’s Treasury Committee at present. This is to attempt to ensure that students’ levy which accounts for roughly 60% the Sports Department’s funding is allocated appropriately. It is estimated that the Department has a budget of over €2.3 million a year.

“We have an ad hoc say,” Trigoub-Rotnem told The University Times. “There should be a formal committee structure with the ability to provide guidance and to reach a decision where everyone’s happy.

The attitude that the Sports Department are taking is: we want your money, not your input.

However, it’s clear that not all the students and sports clubs are happy with this.”

Another group to voice their opinion was the Ladies Hockey Club who examined the subject of sports scholarships and how awareness of them could be increased. Sports Department committee members ensured the hockey team that their “intention this year is to draft a plan” that would “improve profile and standard”.

There were further concerns in the AGM in relation to the cap standing on the number of clubs that exist in DUCAC. Members were once again displeased with the cap, stating that there was “no formal access for new clubs”. However, chairman of the executive committee Chairman Prof Cyril Smyth claimed that DUCAC “cannot fund any kind of club” and there “are not enough funds to spread around”.

Michelle Tanner, acting head of the Department of Sport

Additional matters that arose in the AGM were the election of the Officers on the DUCAC committe. There was not much movement in regards to the positions on the committee, and athletes seemed to be discouraged with the uncontested re-election of the Chairman to the Committee, Cyril Smyth, as the announcement produced a delayed applause and raised hands in protest.

Luke Acheson was elected Secretary of the Committee, Susannah Cass as the Vice Chairman and James Sweeny as the new Treasurer. The Club Representatives this year are Cormac Doherty, Mark Harris, Eoin Kerrigan, Aoife O’Reilly, Sinead Rodger and Elizabeth Shannon. Six other Pavilion Club members were elected through the Executive Committee.

James Sweeney of the GAA club was glad to be elected Treasurer, remarking in the club’s weekly newsletter “Thanks to the lads who got me elected - the more people we have on the financial commitee the more sway we making sure money is handed out fairly.”

In spite of the students’ protests, DUCAC had good news for students that avail of the Pavilion Bar. Small events are being organised in conjunction with Entertainments Officer Darragh Genockey. Plans for karaoke and a silent disco in the near future were some of the ideas mentioned.

This year’s cohort of class reps was told to expect a significant raise in the student registration fee as well as major cutbacks in student support services in the upcoming Budget, which will be delivered on December 7th.

Speaking to the gathering of new class reps at their training weekend in Balbriggan, Union of Students in Ireland Officers outlined the severe blows that students should expect to take in the Budget for 2011.

Top of the list was the now almost inevitable raise in the student registration charge, which is expected to be raised from €1500 to €3000. Cónán O’Broin, USI Deputy President said that the scale of the financial crisis and its implications for students had yet to dawn on most of the student body.

In an interview with The University Times Ó Broin said that “the government is desperate for money and if students don’t put up a fight the registration fee will definitely

go up. Students are seen as a soft target. A hit on students is perceived to have no great political consequences.” Ó Broin explained that there is a “perception that students don’t vote whereas a significant number of pensioners vote. Government TD’s have told us explicitly that they are afraid of targeting pensioners.” During his presentation to the class reps Ó Broin revealed that Finian Mc Grath, the Independent Dublin TD had told USI that he received 584 phone calls in 48 hours when it was announced that medical cards for over70s would be cut. He said that if students are serious about protecting their interests then a similarly proactive attitude is required.

Speaking about the scale of the cuts which students should expect in the Budget, Ó Broin said that he had been told by a Government TD in July that €270 million would need to cut from the Department of Education’s budget.

Continued on p3

A University Times investigation into the practice of using research grants to buy out teaching has revealed a worrying trend of devaluing undergraduate education.

Academics in Trinity College have always had access to a facility that allows them to use money from research grants to compensate for the teaching portion of their workload. This teaching portion would then be passed on to a contract lecturer, who is paid per module they replace.

This practice has been used in the past to give what’s known as “relief” to academics. This would mean that it is used when an academic wishes to engage in a large-scale research project or go on other forms of sabbatical, whether for personal reasons or to improve their ability to carry out their job.

The process involved in attaining research grants is as follows. An application is made for a grant to a specified body; these could be private companies, funds or semi-state entities. This could be a company like Pfizer for medico-pharmaceutical grants, or bodies like the Environmental Protection Agency, Economic and Social Research Institute or the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences for their respective fields.

If this application is successful, the money is deposited with central College authorities, often with conditions attached to its use. The Principal Investigator (P.I.) is then responsible for the funds. A P.I. is the chief signatory or leader of the team applying for the grant.

Some research grants are not for the purposes of buyingout teaching; they are used for smaller, largely overhead purposes such as equipment and travel. However, the majority of the larger grants would necessitate some form of replacement teaching to be paid-for using the grant money, relieving the academic of their teaching duties for a specific duration.

Trinity College views this practice as beneficial for the student body and the university as a whole. It believes that the practice expands the knowledge of lecturers who teach students, improves the standing of the College as a research university, brings funds into the institution and helps in our efforts to rise in the league tables.

Students are likely to find

some aspects of the practice troubling, however. This is particularly the case in light of its expansion in recent years. Our investigation led us to senior academics who described a “marked increase” in teaching buy-outs from temporary relief to established practice.

The question of who is involved in replacement teaching is of central importance. College does not have a system for ensuring that those who leave on sabbatical or because of research grants are replaced by those with comparable qualifications.

The University Times’ investigation produced evidence of specific instances where Professors and other senior academics were replaced by contract lecturers who were not in possession of a PhD. This is not necessarily an indication of poorer teaching, but would seem to open the door to lower standards. Any expansion in this area would seem to undermine College’s assertions that esteemed senior academics are appointed at least in part to give undergraduate students the best teaching experience.

There are, however, some incentives to hire contract lecturers with postgraduate degrees.

Only those with such qualification can be used as module coordinators or appointed examiners.

In the course of researching this story, the paper spoke to some of those hired as contract lecturers to do replacement teaching. While their disciplines varied, it was possible to average the cost they were being paid per module to around €3,000.

This merits contrast with the yearly salaries of the Professors (€108 – 138k), Associate Professors (€79 - 105k) or Senior Lecturers (€70 – 89k) who they may be asked to replace.

Academic contracts in Trinity College are not specifically broken down by task. Older contracts can be as little as three lines long. Newer contracts are more detailed but no division of workload is established.

However, a notional division of tasks was articulated by Ned Costello, CEO of the Irish Universities’ Association at a September 23rd, 2010, meeting of the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee.

In a discussion with Roisín Shortall, T.D., about pay for academic staff he outlined a theoretical Continued on p2

The University Times Editor: Tom Lowe Deputy Editor: Tommy Gavin Volume 2, Issue 1 Phone: 01 646 8431 Email: info@universitytimes.ie

This newspaper is produced with the financial support of Trinity College Students’ Union. It is editorially independent and claims no special rights or privileges.

The Editor, The University Times, 6 Trinity College Dublin 2 Website: www.universitytimes.ie

Tuesday, October 19th 2010 | The University Times

2

TimesNews

“As a nation, we are living away beyond our means” Declan Harmon, p10

A week in the life of Trinity’s Twitterati

What’s inside?

TimesFeatures

Are students sick of Civil War politics? Our survey shows them moving towards the Labour Party. Ian Curran looks at this shift in the European context.

Tiernan Kennedy

Megan Nolan

Annelise Berghenti

@tiernankennedy

@Megaroooo

@anniberg

had my first facetime call yesterday. It’s just like skype, as in I wanna turn off the video function after two minutes of waving

OVERHEARD IN TRINITY MAC ROOMS (boy sitting alone muttering at computer screen): “Eat my dick, I go to Trinity”.

Just remembered talking to a girl who has always mysteriously hated me last night. I got nervous, and poked her tit by mistake. Horrific.

Full drugs survey results: Tommy Gavin goes in-depth and tells us why Ireland needs comprehensive drug policy reform.

TimesOPINION The Vice Provost & Dean of Students on recognising student engagement Eugene Reavey on “Red Ed Miliband” as he stands on the precipice of a speedy Labour revival and... Have you got the shift yet? A treatise on that most Irish of phenomena. Sean McGrenaghan analyses Ireland’s most valuable cultural export

Timessports

Dan Bergin tries American Football and lives to tell the tale.

Ross Dungan on running the Dublin Marathon for Alzheimers Ireland and his mother’s sage advice

It’s the hipster issue! Get on your fixie and roll your eyes, because being a dickhead’s cool. Our contributors discuss the commercialisation of art and culture.

Katie Abrahams talks to Two Door Cinema Club about not reading their reviews, making money and selling their songs to advertisers Rachel Shearer slates hipster night “Bad Kids” Caoimhe Bradseá goes hunting The Social Network Review: does the Sorkin & Fincher dream team deliver on the hype?

Ana Kinsella @karlusss

@genockey @rippedkneez

Just dealt with an insurance company called ‘FML Insurance’. Definitely didn’t think that one through.

Depression Workshop in college. “Arrive early to avoid disappointment.” Kickin’ bros when they’re down.

tearing up at the miners. this is the happiest thing in the WORLD

Poll shows 56% of Trinity students took drugs in last year Tommy Gavin Deputy Editor According to a poll conducted by The University Times, over half of Trinity students said that they have tried illegal drugs at least once in the last year, and 30% said at least between one and three times in the last three months. Cannabis was by far the drug of choice, with 52.2% trying it compared with 44.2% who have abstained from drugs in that period. The survey showed that of those who tried drugs excluding cannabis, 92.2% also tried cannabis. However, of those who tried cannabis, 26.7% was the highest percentage of anything else tried (both ecstasy and mephedrone).

The next highest registered drug taken in that period is mephedrone at 15.2%, despite it not being illegal until last summer. Students said that they are less likely to try illegal drugs when faced with the possibility of criminal charges, with 41.8% agreeing or strongly agreeing with the statement.

However, 56.7% disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement that they are more likely to try a drug if it is legal, and only 29.6% agreed or strongly agreed.

The survey comes at a point when the country is still reacting to the addition of several substances to the Misuse of Drugs act of 1977, including cannabinoids, BZP and

mephedrone, which are supposed to imitate the effects of cannabis, ecstasy and cocaine respectively. Their possession and supply are subject to criminal sanction of up

Students took a fancy to mephedrone in the last year, but not quite to the extent that many would imagine.

to 7 years imprisonment and/ or a fine for unlawful possession, and on indictment, up to a maximum period of life imprisonment for unlawful supply. It is still possible to order mephedrone over the internet however, and mephedrone has joined more traditional drugs as a major contributor to Ireland’s underground economy.

The Psychotropic Substances Bill which has yet to be enacted, would make it illegal to sell pipes and water-pipes used for consuming psychoactive drugs, and make it illegal to sell objects used to cultivate drugs by hydroponic means, allowing penalties of up to five years in prison and fines of €5,000 upon conviction.

Trinity students who wish to indulge themselves in a legal capacity abroad are having their most obvious option taken away as the Dutch government will be introducing a new law whereby only card-carrying Dutch citizens will be able to purchase soft-drugs in the country’s notorious cafés, in an effort to curb drug tourism.

However, the expected passing of Proposition 19 in California, which will be voted on between this issue of the University Times and the next, will likely see a surge in J1’s to the golden state. The bill will allow government regulation of cannabis related activities and cannabis related tax collection.

Closer to home, the Liberal Democrats of the UK had a policy paper called Honesty, Realism, Responsibility where they called for re-classifiying cannabis and cannabis derivatives as Class C drugs, re-classifying ecstasy from Class A to Class B, and ending imprisonment as a punishment for possession for own use of any Class B or Class C drug. That they will do that now they are in a coalition government with the conservative party is unlikely. The University Times survey shows though, that with an expectant election looming, drug legislation will be a major issue for student voters.

Researchers pawn Mandatory student off lecturing on surveys questioned PhD students Rónán Burtenshaw Deputy News Editor

Continued from p1

breakdown of forty per cent teaching, forty per cent research and twenty per cent administration.

Unions that represent academics have strongly resisted a formalised breakdown of tasks in a workload model, but it provides a certain basis for comparison. If we accept that the €3,000 per module model includes some administration, the lowest-paid Professor would have to teach eighteen modules a year to earn his salary. This would more closely resemble the hours of a secondlevel teacher and be before any consideration of research.

The apparent disparity here is continued when the issue is

Retraction and Apology In the last issue (September 21st) we insinuated a romantic involvement between a senior College officer and a College student. We wish to state unequivocally that this assertion has no basis in fact. We would like to apologise to all parties for this lapse of editorial responsibility and any damage or hurt that it has caused.

In the last issue, we neglected to mention our Photo Editor, Dargan Crowley-Long, in the staff listing. This absurd error should not be taken as an indication of our affection for Dargan, whose incredible skill and titanic efforts make this paper the visually appealing beauty that it is. We would like to apologise to Dargan and his many fans for this oversight.

Karl McDonald

Darragh Genockey

“An all-encompassing feeling of dread”: students’ drug experiences

viewed through the lens of an undergraduate student. Repeat fees vary by course, the lowest fee-bracket, Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, is €4,191 after the Student Service Charge is deducted. Taking that and dividing it by twelve modules in a year, we can see that those students pay in the region of €350 per module.

If there were one hundred students in a module class, and some exceed that amount substantially, the pool of money gained from the student body would be €35,000. Contract or temporary lecturers could get less than a tenth of that money to teach the module.

Lecturers can also be placed on temporary contract to teach modules in the first semester. Given that Trinity College operates a semi-semesterised system, where two semesters exist but examinations are held only at the end of College year, it is possible that these staff will not be in place at that time. Staff on temporary contracts could be offered positions in universities outside Ireland and may not be in the country when these examinations take place.

But most worrying of all is that academic sources revealed to The University Times the existence of senior figures who engage in little or no undergraduate teaching. This seems to be occurring to a much greater degree than previously.

It has been the opinion of Trinity that academics who engage in research are in turn better qualified to teach undergraduates. This belief has widespread support across the international academic community. However, there is also recognition of a “tipping

point”. This envisages a scenario wherein the more research the academic conducts, the better teacher they become.

This is true up until the point where their research severely limits their undergraduate teaching or prevents it from happening entirely.

A good indicator of the path that the university is pursuing in this regard would be to look at the institutions higher up the league tables which it hopes to emulate. In many of the Ivy League institutions in the U.S.A., the highestpaid, top academics teach only the most minimal amount of classes. Their jobs consist almost entirely of engaging in research.

Tellingly, student satisfaction surveys in those Colleges paint a consistent picture of disillusionment among the student body. Many students see the most renowned and highest-paid academics in their institutions only a handful of times before they graduate.

This is mitigated somewhat by polls of those students. These clearly show emphasis being placed on receipt of a degree from a prestigious university rather than quality of education they receive.

It is unclear whether College will see such a shift towards research in its top academics, or to what extent the practice of replacement teaching will increase. It is, however, clear that there are a number of concerns for undergraduates. Coming on the back of the release by this paper last week of an academic survey which showed that staff believed there was “less time for teaching and research” in a more bureaucratic system, it’s clear that this is an issue that must be addressed.

New mandatory student surveys will prove “ineffective” and are a means of “obfuscating” the issue of student feedback, senior academic sources have told The University Times.

In May of this year, senior departmental academics in charge of education received an e-mail from College about a new policy on student surveys.

The e-mail said that College had approved a new system of mandatory surveys of individual class or module groups.

These surveys were to happen in an online, centralized procedure every one to three years.

In this new system academics will be given the option to author their own survey.

Alternatively, they can take part in the College process where persons with relevant responsibility would author one for them. The e-mail was clear that questionnaires were the “preferred” method but did say that others “may be employed in the future”.

However, a number of academics have spoken to The University Times to convey their dissatisfaction with the arrangement. One of the problems outlined was that while the survey was mandatory for academics, students were free to decide whether to do it or not.

“Online surveys of this nature,” one source said, “will almost certainly get a very low rate of response from students.

Academics are in the position of having to go through the process of surveying their students… [and] if they are really interested in the the accuracy of the outcome, they will want to write their own surveys.

But after spending that time there will be no compulsion

for students to answer, and students are busier and busier today, so I understand that they wouldn’t.”

Another source highlighted the potentially dispiriting outcome of the process. “College raised recently, I believe fairly, the issue of stress-testing of their academic survey.

The same issue will apply here.

Students will take the survey in lower numbers and the likely majority that were satisfied with the course will be less incentivised to respond than

“the likely majority that were satisfied with the course will be less incentivised to respond than those who strongly disliked, or even liked, the course” those who strongly disliked, or even liked, the course. But students are a grumpy bunch, especially when discussing their lecturers!”

The University Times was given access to some of the proposed survey formats and problems became obvious. It was apparently possible for a student who had a series of lecturers during a module to be asked questions about them in general. Questionnaires had numerous references to “lecturer(s)”. This raises questions about how survey accuracy and effectiveness. Being asked to grade the average

performance of lecturers across a module would likely give a poor insight into individual performance.

It would appear that the new mandatory student surveys are College’s response to the difficult issue of internal feedback.

While many academics have long-standing practices of producing their own student satisfaction surveys, the university has come in for criticism for not having a more established and strategic system for gaining feedback from students.

In 2004/05, the European Universities Association reviewed Irish universities in an “Institutional Evaluation Programme”. The conclusions of its report were highly critical in the area of feedback. In a comparison the report indicated that major Irish universities like Trinity College were behind European universities of the same calibre in this field. A failure to establish a formal process for acquiring that feedback was specifically highlighted. The issue of student satisfaction with College standards of teaching is particularly important in the current climate. In our last issue, The University Times revealed the existence of an academic survey which showed a large majority of academics felt that they had less time for teaching.

“That survey was important,” our source felt, “and it said something about the way the restructuring process was put in place. But now we are instituting a new survey system that is mandatory for all academics. Some of the same mistakes are being made. It looks a bit like a token measure meant to satisfy criticism, or at least obfuscate the issue.

Student satisfaction with their standard of education should be more important than that.”

3

The University Times | Tuesday, October 19th 2010

TimesNews

VP: Trinity faces financial ‘breaking point’ Barra Roantree College Affairs Correspondent

From his office overlooking a noisy front square, the ViceProvost paints a bleak picture of the funding situation facing the college. The government block grant, the largest single source of funding, has fallen from over €100m to €65m since 2008. The financial crisis has reduced the income from the college’s investments while philanthropic donations have fallen.

Patrick Prendergast, the Vice-Provost/Chief Academic Officer holds responsibilities spanning across the college and is frequently touted as a candidate in the forthcoming Provostorial election. As chair of the powerful Planning Group, Prendergast oversees implementation of the Strategic Plan and the funding issues facing the College.

“What we want to do above all is maintain the quality of undergraduate and postgraduate education, and that requires money. Even in the downturn over the last two years, I feel we’ve done as best we can to maintain the quality and maintain provision of student services. And that’s been done by individuals really stretching themselves, academic and administrative staff stretching current resources to perhaps breaking point … and there’s not much further we can go here”. Prendergast’s big fear is that the December budget with its drive for austerity will lead to a further cut in the core grant. As he sees it, that would be catastrophic for the college, going “beyond breaking point, to the situation where quality of education provision is going to suffer. Fewer lecturers, fewer labs, this is what we’re facing.”

Trinity is required to balance its budget under the Universities Act, and yet is subject to government demands to reduce staff numbers and slash costs at the same time as increasing student numbers and supporting “innovation”.

When the Provost wrote to the Higher Education Authority (HEA) earlier this year to warn that the college was expecting to run a deficit for the academic year 2009-10, the HEA

Robotnik gig shut down due to noise complaints

responded bluntly that this was not acceptable. While the college may have managed to close the gap last year, it is projecting a significant deficit for each of the years to 2015.

Prendergast says that “Faculty Deans and the Chief Operating Officer have been tasked by the Planning Group to cut 5% in expenditure” for this current year, but insists that “reducing expenditure is going to have to go alongside increasing income, and diversifying income away from Exchequer sources”. He sees the introduction of tuition fees in some form as likely in the coming years given the pressure on the public finances, and supports schemes whereby students “wouldn’t have to pay at the point of entry”. The publication last week of the Browne Review on Higher Education in the UK has put pressure on the Irish Department of Education to publish its own review authored by economist Colin Hunt, and could reignite the issue of student fees in Ireland.

Presently tuition fees are paid by the government for all Irish and EU students, bringing in about €43m in revenue for Trinity every year on top

Quality of education provision is going to suffer. Fewer lecturers, fewer labs, this is what we’re facing

of state grants, research funding and other operational income. Any moves to introduce a student contribution would see students instead of government paying the tuition fee, perhaps with the student registration fee added on.

This means that for Trinity to see a real increase in funding, the government would have to

News in brief

The Ents Live Robotnik gig, co-hosted by Trinity Ents and DU Players in the Players’ Theatre, was shut down by campus security last Tuesday. The gig was the first of its kind to be played in the Players’ Theatre, as part of a new initiative

by Ents Officer Darragh Genockey called Trinity Ents Live.

Unaware that there is a noise curfew on campus, Genockey’s gig went on longer than was originally scheduled, invoking the rage of residents of New Square, some of whom are senior academics.

Undeterred, Genockey fully intends to host more gigs in the Players’ Theatre, saying to The University Times that “we’ll just have to be more careful of show timing for the Blink 182 Tribute gig on Tuesday 19th and for all future shows.”

Former Law lecturer set for the High Court Former law lecturer Dr Gerard Hogan SC has been nominated to the High Court, replacing Mr Justice Liam McKechnie, who was appointed to the Supreme Court in July.

The appointment will be made by President Mary McAleese.

Dr Hogan lectured in the Law School from 1982 to 2007 and was elected a Fellow of the College during that period.

He has had an illustrious career as both a legal academic and a barrister.

Called to the Bar in 1984 and becoming a senior counsel in 1997, Dr Hogan worked on several seminal constitutional cases, most famously his representation of Senator David Norris in the Norris case which ultimately lead to the decriminalisation of homosexual activity in Ireland.

Since 1987 he has co-written, along with Professor Gerry Whyte, updated versions of Kelly’s “The Irish Constitution”.

The Vice-Provost makes his point in his interview with College Affairs Correspondent Barra Roantree. Photo: Dargan Crowley-Long use savings made to increase the block grant - an unlikely proposition while it is searching for €4bn in savings this year alone - or raise tuition fees by a substantial amount.

Prendergast acknowledges the potential for Irish students to look abroad if either the quality of higher education at home is judged to be falling, or fee levels make foreign universities attractive.

Regardless of the introduction of any form of student contribution, universities will still be largely dependent on the government for funding, through the block grant and

research grants from the state and semi-state bodies. Irish spending on tertiary education declined as a share of both public spending and education spending during the boom years, and to a large extent this is the cause of the funding difficulties facing universities across Ireland. The failure of the higher education sector to convince successive governments and voters of its importance is a theme Prendergast takes up. “Universities have to make a strong case, and they have to make the case to Irish society in general, that the provision of high quality higher education is of benefit to all” he says, pointing out a role for Students’ Unions in this task.

It is clear that Prendergast places a high value on the quality of education for both undergraduates and post-graduate students. Concern for maintaining the quality of a Trinity education underlies his belief in the need for a student contribution, rather than an ideological desire to see autonomous universities independent of government control. Later in our conversation, he insists that “senior staff right up to the senior lecturers should be engaging with undergraduates” in both junior and senior freshmen years.

With the financial position of the college under such strain, it remains to be seen if student services like the medical centre

or clubs and societies funded from the registration fee will escape cutbacks. The quality of both undergraduate and graduate degrees will come under increasing pressure as ever more cuts are demanded. The funding of higher education is a complex issue that doesn’t get much discussion in public. The gains to universities of a student loan scheme rests on the willingness of the government to reinvest any savings to the exchequer in higher education.

Whoever is victorious in this year’s Provostorial election faces a huge task in managing the funding challenge, and the issue will be foremost on the campaign trail.

Trinity physicists working with NASA to “chase solar storms” By monitoring the material strewn from solar storms Trinity scientists will more accurately predict whether telecommunications on Earth will be disrupted.

With data from twin satellites that offer three-dimensional views of the sun, scientists tracked how streams of energy from solar storms travel from the sun’s atmosphere to Earth.

Solar storms are enormous eruptions of hot gas from the surface of the sun that can move into the solar system, explained Dr Peter Gallagher, a senior lecturer in astrophysics.

The magnetic properties of solar storms are liable to disrupt telecommunications, GPS and satellites. Trinity’s scientists discovered that the material that reaches Earth as a result of solar eruptions doesn’t necessarily travel in a straight line, with material that reached the North Pole tending to be deflected down towards the plane of where planets orbit.

€1.5 million grant given to TCD bioengineer Students in firing line for for research into stem cell therapies Staff Listing

Editor Tom Lowe Deputy Editor Tommy Gavin News Editor Ronan Costello Features Editor Tommy Gavin Opinion Editor Marykate Collins Sports Editor Manus Cronin Deputy News EDITOR Rónán Burtenshaw Deputy Opinion EDITOR Eugene Reavey PHOTO EDITOR Dargan Crowley-Long Social MEdia EDITOR Guy Arbell Web Editor Conor Smith Design AND INFOGRAPHICS Richard Conway

Tomás Sullivan Staff Writer A researcher in the Trinity Centre for Bioengineering has been awarded a European Research Council (ERC) grant towards his research into the use of Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs) to develop a preventative treatment for arthritis.

Professor Daniel Kelly, of the Trinity Centre for Bioengineering, has been awarded an ERC ‘Starting Independent Researcher Grant’ of €1.5m, which will go towards five years of research. The grant is targeted specifically at young researchers to enable them to become fully independent. Only 300 researchers from around Europe, working in fields ranging from physics to the humanities, receive this grant and he is one of only 2 successful Irish candidates.

Prof. Kelly’s project seeks to develop and improve existing therapies for repairing damaged articular cartilage with MSCs, which, untreated, can develop into arthritis. Articular cartilage, when damaged as a result of an injury, has difficulty in repairing itself and regenerating, and therefore such wounds can develop into arthritus. MSCs can be extracted from damaged and diseased joints and used to produce articular cartilage grafts in a laboratory environment, which

can then be used to repair the damaged cartilage.

Prof Kelly seeks to make this process more efficient, by attempting to understand the relationship between environmental conditions, namely oxygen tension and the mechanical environment, and the successful growth of articular cartilage. The aim of such research is to develop a process that can produce functional cartilage tissue, ready to be transplanted, within hours.

This could result in a leading new preventative treatment of arthritus. Furthermore, once applied to one area, it is possible that there will be other applications, such as potentially treating larger cartilage defects in osteoarthritic joints.

The ERC’s recognition of this project highlights the vast advances being made in stem cell research, and the key role TCD is playing in such advances.

However, controversy over the use of embryonic stem cells, tends to overshadow the entire field of stem cell research. Professor Gerry Whyte of the law school commented that ‘many people, upon coming across the words ‘stem cell research’, automatically assume that there is ethical or legal controversy involved.’ This is despite the fact that there is ‘absolutely no ethical question’, when the destruction of an embryo is not concerned in any way.

budget

Continued from p1 This figure has since been revised upwards twice and now stands at €400-500 million. Ó Broin didn’t rule out the likelihood of the figure being revised upwards again to roughly €600 million.

Put in context, €500 million represents 28% of the €1.8 billion which is open to cuts in the Departments, with the remainder of its €9 billion budget spent on wages and pensions, which are untouchable under the terms of the Croke Park agreement.

A likely victim of these cuts will be the student grant which was cut by 5% in last year’s Budget. Ó Broin and USI believe that the grant could suffer a cut of up to 10% in the coming Budget. Since last year’s grant cut USI has been inundated with students telling them that they have had to drop out of college and sign on the dole.

It’s estimated that there are between 70,000-100,000 graduates aged between 20-25 on the dole, a far higher proportion than in any other demographic. Ó Broin explains that he has heard stories from students who are forced to live on €18 a week, sustained only by a meagre €400 grant that has to last

them three months. A female student recently contacted USI to plead for help because she was limited to spending €1 a day on food. The former TCDSU President calls this is an intolerable situation, one which will only be made worse by the seemingly inevitable cuts. Citing the Irish Independent’s report on students turning to stripping and prostitution to pay their way through college, Ó Broin says that a student living on the grant is essentially living below the poverty line as the grant is far less generous than social welfare payments.

One group of students who are likely to face a bleak future after the Budget are TAP students who rely on the Student Support Fund to attend college.

The Student Support Fund, according to SU Welfare Officer, Steph Fleming, would suffer if a cut to the grant were to be implemented. This could result in 150 of Trinity’s students facing up to the realisation that a college education is no longer financially viable.

To combat these cuts and the raising of the registration charge USI has called on all undergraduate students to march on the Dáil on November 3rd. USI hopes to have at least 25,000 students in attendance.

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Tuesday, October 19th 2010 | The University Times

TimesNews

Over 100 Muslim students accommodated for prayer in rooms accommodating a maximum of 30 Mould on the walls and sewage in the sink of Muslim students’ place of worship Ronan Costello News Editor

Above: The Brothers prayer room. There were ten prayer mats in the room when The University Times were invited to see the room.

Over a hundred Brothers had turned up that day to pray.

Left: The sink where those about to pray have to wash. The sink frequently backs up with sewage.

Below: The waste collection point in Goldsmith, adjacent to the MSA prayer rooms. Photos: Kevin O’Rourke

The state of facilities offered to Muslim students in Trinity has become a matter of contention between college authorities and the Muslim Students Association (MSA). Trinity’s Muslim community is currently using two dilapidated rooms to observe their daily prayer obligations. The suitability of these rooms has been at issue for over a decade, according to a senior source within the MSA, with the matter being brought to the attention of the SU, CSC and the College Authority.

The MSA’s rooms, which are located to the rear of Goldsmith Halls, are deemed entirely unfit for purpose by the college’s Muslim community. The MSA has over 200 members and estimates the college’s Muslim community to number roughly 200. Upon viewing the two prayer rooms provided to the MSA by CSC, it’s clear to The University Times that the maximum capacity of each room is 15 people. This issue of capacity is particularly problematic to a community that takes great pride in its dutiful observance of its religious obligations, with adherents praying five times daily and at least once a day within a group.

On Friday last, over a hundred male Muslim students gathered in Goldsmith, with the resulting consequence that all female Muslim students were forced to pray elsewhere. The Brothers, as they are known, then gathered in the prayer rooms, with many being made to pray in the corridor outside the rooms. The overspill is problematic as a matter of convenience and comfort but also because the worshippers are obliged to pray in a clean space. The paint on the wall on the right hand side of the corridor is peeling and mould is growing where persistent condensation forms due to the lack of circulation in the area. The corridor is also used as a means to get to the prayer rooms as well as the Niteline storage room and is therefore not an adequately clean space.

In a letter to CSC Secretary Tim Forde, MSA Treasurer Stephen Roche (Ibrahim bin Abdullah) said that the ‘sinks, which are required for ritual ablutions, regularly overflow with backed up sewage and result in a terrible smell which thus prevents suitable use of the rooms.’ The Irish branch of the Federation of Student Islamic Societies has said that as

a result of these structural deficiencies there is a genuine health and safety concern and that the area is in serious need of repair or, preferably, relocation.

Indeed the area in which the rooms are housed has been described as a basement, it being characterised by low, curved walls and ceilings and its position, adjacent to the waste collection point.

The surrounding society rooms are also a cause of consternation for the MSA, as quite a few of them are musically orientated. This, combined with the DART frequently passing overhead results in an intolerable level of noise which makes peaceful prayer almost impossible.

The MSA originally contacted CSC with their concerns.

However, they were told that in order to secure a specially designated prayer space they would have to lobby the college authorities to either designate a pre-existing space as a prayer space or construct an entirely new facility. The MSA then made its case to the college authorities, only to be told by the College Secretary, Anne FitzGerald, that the issue was ‘under active consideration’ and that the college was working towards what it hoped would be a satisfactory conclusion.

When The Univeristy Times enquired as to what progress had been made on the issue the College Communications Officer said that the ‘Director of Buildings Office is currently developing plans to address these concerns for discussion with the Muslim Society with a view to having a resolution within a matter weeks.’ This statement seemed to contradict an earlier statement given by the MSA in which they said that the issue of a new prayer space, at least in relation to the provision of one within the new Student Centre, had been taken off the agenda by the college.

The MSA said that in the past year it has entertained luminaries of the Muslim world such as Tariq Ali and that they had all been appalled at the conditions in which Muslim students were expected to worship. Indeed, all international Muslim students seem to share this disgust, an issue which should be of great concern to the College Authority if it seeks to attract high-paying Muslim students, the highest concentration of which study in the Health Sciences faculty.

College approves Maths Damage limitation order of the day at bonus points Class Rep Training Tom Lowe Editor College Board has approved the Irish Universities’ Association’s proposal that students who pass Higher Level Mathematics in the Leaving Certificate should receive an extra 25 points in the CAO applications process. The system will be put in place on a fouryear trial basis for students sitting the exams in 2012.

The bonus points system is designed to increase the number of students attempting Higher Level Maths, which is attempted by only 16% of those taking the subject, the lowest rate of any subject.

The scheme will run in concert with the new Project Maths

initiative, which is intended to make Maths more approachable to the average student.

The implementation of bonus points was opposed at all stages by the Students’ Union: Education Officer Jen Fox called it a “Band-Aid over a gaping lesion”, referring to the quality of second-level Mathematics teaching.

President Nikolai TrigoubRotnem said “This is a shortterm strategy which does nothing to solve the problems with second-level Mathematics teaching in this country. The majority of second-level Maths teachers are not fully qualified, and until that is resolved, students’ understanding of Maths will reflect the poor teaching they receive. The Department

of Education has taken none of the steps necessary to solve the problems with second level Mathematics.”

A 2008 survey by the IUA showed that 61% of students who sit Higher Level Maths do not go into College courses which use the skills learned in secondary school, in fields such as Engineering and Science.

Fox said “I wouldn’t mind if the bonus points applied to Engineering, Mathematics, Science and Technology courses only,” suggesting that compromise was possible on the issue.

SU representatives had opposed the proposal at three separate committees but were overruled at each.

Ronan Costello News Editor The much-maligned SU class rep training conference was held over the past weekend in The Bracken Hotel in Balbriggan. The event was attended by 250 class reps as well as the SU executive and all Sabbatical Officers.

Last year’s conference was the subject of significant controversy with a damages bill estimated by Trinity News to be in excess of €3000, attracting negative national news coverage and calling into question the need for training to be spread over two days.

According to Jen Fox, SU Education Officer, this year’s conference was a much more

civilised affair, with minimal damage caused to hotel property.

“It was a fantastic experience,” said Fox, “the training component was really well received and was built upon the successes of the last two years.

I had several people come up to me afterwards saying it was incredibly beneficial.”

This year’s cohort of reps is the largest in the Union’s history with 316 class reps for 440 positions, representing a 75% take-up in each faculty. As a result Fox comments that “the hotel was at capacity, pushing the boundaries in terms of the amount of people who could fit into the space.” Many reps ended up sleeping on camp beds and up to ten people slept in

the larger suites.

While the evening’s activities on the Saturday night were much more low key than those of the previous year Fox admits that “there will undoubtedly be some sort of mess when you have 250 people in one place for two days.” However, by and large people stayed downstairs in the pub where the SU had arranged for discounted drink prices Fox conceded that there was a case to be made for the event to be a non-alcohol event. It is naturally and correctly assumed that most of the behaviour at last year’s event was driven by the significant level of drinking done in hotel rooms as opposed to in the hotel bar. However, the decision

was made not to ban alcohol at the event as such a move would require the event to be restyled says Fox. She explains that such an event would be more suited to a campsite, as the non-alcoholic experience would require a location which would more easily encourage bonding among the reps.

For the moment Fox believes that it’s safer to leave it as an alcohol event, as it’s “better to have them drinking in the bar than taking booze up to their rooms.”

In anticipation of a repeat of last year’s antics the hotel put on three extra security guards and required all attendants to wear an orange wristband, which prevented non-reps from getting into the event.

These measures ensured that damage was kept to a relative minimum. Fox said that there was one room which was particularly messy, with lamps on the floor, a couple of bulbs broken and the phone pulled out of the wall. Elsewhere there were lots of lampshades in the corridors, roughly eleven of them were either broken or misplaced. One wall was covered in fairy liquid. The SU has committed itself to e-mailing the people who stayed in the damaged rooms and recouping the costs.

Accidental damage in included a shattered glass shower door, which occurred in during the day, the rep having fallen in on it, before any drink had been consumed.

5

The University Times | Tuesday, October 19th 2010

Higher than the sun

TimesFeatures

Rory O’Donovan, Fleur Moriarty, Richard Conway and Tommy Gavin contribute to a special feature on Trinity students and their relationships with drugs Rory O’Donovan Staff Writer Drugs and students have, and perhaps always will have, an undeniable proximity. The combination of forbidden fruit shrouded in legend and recently liberated largely affluent youngsters, is a potent one. Dublin’s students form a complex subset of a wider drugs scene, with a mixture of regular, casual, ‘legal-only’ and non users, who all express hugely varying reactions to the drugs that circulate in Dublin’s nightclubs and colleges alike.

The purpose of this feature is not to offer opinion or pass judgement, but instead it hopes to offer you, the reader, a broader overview of the relationship between drugs and students, by means of detailing the stories of some students who have experienced its intricacies first hand. All of those I interviewed either are, or were, Trinity College students but, for a whole host of obvious reasons, any other personal details have been changed to protect their identities. Here are their stories …

Matthew and his friends take mephedrone, cocaine, MDMA and ketamine on a regular basis. Although, Matthew admits, there was ‘more consistency to the party scene last year’ – due mainly, he asserts, to the widespread popularity of mephedrone – he is adamant that ‘sure, more people did it when you could buy “bath-salts” over the counter, but there are other ways of getting it. People are maybe doing it less often now, but I wouldn’t say there are less people doing it.’

Matthew first took mephedrone aged 16 in a nightclub in his home town, something which he labels ‘a little overwhelming at first, but after a few weeks I could handle it and then it was … well, amazing.’ Over the next few years, Matthew tells me, he ‘rarely turned anything down’ and by the time he arrived at college he had tried everything that he had wanted to.

Powders became his drugs of choice and, whereas his preference used to be for cocaine and mephedrone, it is now more for MDMA and ketamine.

Matthew confesses that he would ‘seldom venture on a night out without a bag of something to keep us going.’

I asked Matthew whether he thought he and his friends took drugs too often, or whether he believed they were living very dangerously by taking the amounts that they did. He smiled at me, shook his head and took a deep breath before answering. ‘Listen,’ he

said, ‘I have friends who smoke 30 cigarettes a day and drink themselves to sleep regularly and, to be honest, I think they are living just as dangerously as me. Just because the drugs I take are illegal, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are any more harmful.

I am happy in the belief that I can handle what I take.’

Martha told me that she first encountered pills as legal-highs and subsequently decided that she felt comfortable enough with the effects that they had on her that she decided to try illegal pills. In the company of her closest friends, in the unreal environment of a music festival, she tells me that she had the time of her life. ‘At festivals, in an emergency, you know there won’t be any potentially embarrassing trips to the hospital, only a short journey to a medical van, where the staff are expecting you rather than judging you. It is also the kind of place where friends who haven’t tried drugs before, decide to, and so it becomes a much nicer experience, with less friends passing judgement and more joining in.’

I asked Martha to describe to me what taking pills felt like … ‘once you feel it … your head quickly begins to feel completely detached from your body. You walk around a grimy nightclub or a grubby campsite and it seems the most exciting and interesting place in the world … The whole thing is accompanied by a constant and extreme sense of this being the most fun

Your SU Diary contains a lot of useful information and has a wide variety of uses. Photo: Dargan Crowley-Long graphically described to me the pow- boyfriend, we didn’t want to touch leaving the house. er of a bad ‘come-down’ and, particu- each other, there was no question of ‘I lost touch with so many good larly, one that was so bad it made her ‘spooning’ or ‘cuddling’ … a depres- friends, through laziness for sure, but decide to stop taking pills. She de- sion takes over you that finds comfort also through a scary, emerging selfscribed the ‘come-down’ in question in absolutely nothing.’ She remem- ishness; but when I was smoking I as beginning with an all-encompass- bers her friend’s younger sibling com- didn’t care. I had slowly lost the abiling feeling of dread that is difficult ing in after the second day and ask- ity to socialize properly; I struggled for to describe – ‘like waking up from a ing ‘what the hell is wrong with these words quite often. I felt idiocy creepnightmare and that feeling of horror people?’ and eventually she made it ing up on me. I lost track of college not going away’ – and that this feeling home. ‘There was no thought of work work completely and ended up failof dread gripped her just as everyone or college, I just wanted to sleep and it ing exams. At stages I felt that my life else was heading home after Trinity took three or four days to come back to was in complete chaos and I would be Ball. Martha looked visibly distressed reality. There were exams to be stud- truly scared, but then I’d smoke and telling this tale: ied for which I eventually failed. The would be encompassed by that hazy ‘I felt that I couldn’t go home, my consequences were annoying but the false calm. Mostly I would associate body and head ached and myself and experience was horrific. If I had had to any panic with the need to smoke and my boyfriend – who was in a similar deal with that in a tent at a festival, I so I would, rather than face the real state – genuinely considered finding would have been suicidal. It was 100% problems … that smoking had created a doorway in town to collapse in. We not worth it.’ in the first place.’ eventually dragged ourselves back to Luke started smoking cannaJohn smokes cannabis everyday a friend’s house, but they wouldn’t an- bis regularly when he moved into a and has done ‘for years.’ Throughout swer the door so we collapsed in the house with friends in his second year my interview with him, he was totalporch. Neither of us could sleep, but at college. ‘I didn’t really notice until a ly inflexible regarding any suggestion we couldn’t talk either … eventual- friend asked me when the last night I of either supposed or proven medical ly we were let in and we took over the hadn’t smoked weed was … and I hon- side effects of cannabis abuse. As far friend’s younger sibling’s bedroom estly couldn’t remember.’ Having fos- as John is concerned ‘smoking weed for the next couple of days. What was tered a serious habit over a period of is good for you and I have no idea to come was something I felt I truly six months, Luke began trying to quit, why everyone doesn’t do it.’ I warned you have ever had, or the happiest couldn’t deal with: vomiting all day which took him a further six months. John that people might label him as you’ve ever been. Music and dancing for two days without being able to ‘Weed is a sneaky drug. It’s the kind something of a stereotype or not take … it’s hard to describe how much fun sleep … of drug that you don’t notice its effects him particularly seriously because of it is and how energetic you are listen‘The mental stuff is as bad as the until you stop smoking it. It wasn’t these views (a warning delivered due ing to music and dancing when you’re physical, you’re disgusted with your- until I was trying to quit and could, to the fact that I was beginning to label on pills. You just wouldn’t do it some- self for being in that state, you all sit at first, only force myself to go two or him as a stereotype and not take him where you knew there wouldn’t be around, the mates who you were hav- three days without it, that I finally saw seriously) but John kept talking and, music.’ ing so much fun with days earlier, how unsociable I had become; only to give him credit, he was utterly enHaving discussed what Martha disgusted at each other, without the spending time with those I smoked gaging and I began to find myself liswould consider the positives, she also ability to talk, or eat. In bed with my with, often going days on end without tening absorbedly once more.

John first smoked cannabis at 14, but didn’t start smoking it regularly In Depth: Tommy Gavin examines our survey results in detail and finds some surprising results. until his late teens. He tells me that he was diagnosed with ADHD during 64% of those disagree or strongly disagree that 43.9% say they never do drugs.

Drug users (within the last year) secondary school and, although he 92.2% of students who said they have taken they are more likely to try a drug if it is legal, Cannabis users doesn’t claim to smoke for medicinal drugs other then cannabis, have also taken 24.6% agree or strongly agree.

Of those who have used cannabis in the last year, purposes, he insists his condition has cannabis within that year.

Those who strongly/agree that criminality is a 26.7% have also tried ecstasy in the last year, improved since he began regularly 51% of students who have taken drugs disagree dissuasion 26.7% have also tried mephedrone. The next ‘getting high’. John attributes both his or strongly disagree that the threat of criminal 66.9% of those who agree that criminal charges highest percentage for drug taken in the last year ‘stress-free philosophy’ and his ‘procharges will dissuade them from taking drugs in dissuade them from trying illegal drugs have for those who have used cannabis is 14.8% for found artistic nature’ to his cannathe future. never do drugs. cocaine. bis habit and, again, to give him cred50% of students who who have taken drugs 40.2% of those agree or strongly agree that they 36.9% of cannabis users only use drugs 1 to 3 it, both are highly evident during our disagree or strongly disagree that they are more would try a drug if it was legal. times a year. interview. I asked John firstly whethlikely to try a drug if it is legal, 33.5% agree or 36.2% of those have tried cannabis in the last 53.4% disagree or strongly disagree that the er he thinks he will ever stop smoking strongly agree. year. threat of criminal charges will dissuade them cannabis and, secondly, whether he Drug abstainers (within last year) Those who strongly/agree that they would try a from taking illegal drugs. would like his children to smoke. He 57.5% of those who have not taken drugs agree drug if it was legal answered me with a wry smile ‘do you or strongly agree that they are less likely to try 57.2% agree or strongly agree that they are less know I’m not sure I ever will quit. But illegal drugs when faced with the possibility likely to try illegal drugs when faced the possibility I am sure I’m not having any children criminal charges. of a criminal charge. … there’s only one thing more expensive than weed in Dublin … and that’s babies.’

The comedown begins with an allencompassing feeling of dread that is difficult to describe – “like waking up from a nightmare and that feeling of horror not going away”

The Official Verdict: Fleur Moriarty talks mephedrone with Sgt Brian Roberts of the Garda National Drugs Unit The majority of students know at least a thing or two about the illegal drugs that have traditionally been available for purchase in Ireland. But what is scary is how little we know about the drugs that were sold to people legally, over the counter, in Head Shops in the past few years. In an attempt to enlighten myself, and you, the reader, I arranged to interview Sgt Brian Roberts, of the Garda National Drugs Unit.

The first thing we discussed was mephedrone, a drug that, quite literally, took Dublin by storm last year. Mr Roberts informed me that ‘Mephedrone’ was an umbrella under which up to seven different products were sold in Head Shops.

Mephedrone contains cathinones and Sgt Roberts noted that interestingly, these do not give the

serotonin-induced euphoria of ecstasy and, furthermore, mephedrone is known not to induce the same energy-increase as cocaine. Yet the side effects and ‘comedowns’ have been documented as, in many cases, far worse than either ecstasy or cocaine. Mr Roberts enlightened me as to some of the effects of mephedrone he has encountered, including extreme two-day comedowns, severe heart pains, and hand and foot discolouration.

Another white powder we discussed was the Head Shop product FluorotropaCocaine, a cocaine-relative known as ‘Whack’. Whack was given national news coverage when it hospitalized forty people in the midlands in May of this year.

I speculate that in any given hospital in Ireland, in the same period of time, there haven’t been this

many cocaine-related admissions.

As far as the Gardai are concerned, the Head Shop boom kicked off in 2006, when BZP, known as ‘Party Pills’ became available for legal purchase in Ireland. Party Pills were branded as a ‘safe alternative’ to ecstasy, were sold in brightly coloured packaging and often labelled as ‘extra strong energy pills’. Mr Roberts told me though that what the box didn’t tell you was that Party Pills were originally used as a cattle de-wormer in New Zealand. The side effects of these apparently innocuous pills are similar to, if not worse than, ecstasy, and include nausea, palpitations, insomnia and in some cases, seizures.

‘Smokeables’ were also a popular group of products available for purchase in Head Shops

including cannibinides (mock-marijuana smokeables) such as ‘Smoke’ and the hallucinogenic ‘Salvia’. These products, Mr Roberts tells me, are manufactured and not organically grown. Basic herbs are laid out and sprayed by ‘mock-THC’ chemicals, before being dried and packaged, in order to be sold and smoked.

Head Shops were also denounced by the Gardai for their apparent leniency as regards age restrictions on purchasing their products. Originally, Head Shops were much less likely to ask for proof of age than, say a bar, and this led to many younger people being exposed to drugs at an early age.

The Results are in: Richard Conway shows us

6

Tuesday, October 19th 2010 | The University Times

TimesFeatures

Labour ascendant in TCD poll In the last twelve months, the Irish Labour Party has undergone a dramatic ascent towards the top of the political opinion polls. For the last year, it has seemed that if a general election was called tomorrow, every taxi driver, barman, barber and other such stereotypically opinionated members of society would fall over themselves rushing for the polling booth to put a giant X beside their local Labour candidates’ name.

But is this sentiment shared by the capital’s student population? Are the students of Dublin University as eager for change as the people who voted for Labour in the tns/MRBI poll of February of this year which put Labour at 24% popularity? Last week, we polled Trinity students and now the results are in, the votes are in, the fat lady has sung and other such clichés that suggest a sense of finality.

When we asked you what

party you would vote for if an election was called before Christmas, 34.9% of you told us that you would vote Labour.

That means that if Trinity students were the only voters in the next general election (and God knows how we’d like to be) then Labour would more than beat their previous record of 33 seats won in the 1992 general election. It would be a red tide, seeing the Labour party, at the very least, taking up a significant amount of seats in the next government. In our poll, that puts Eamonn Gilmore’s party almost 20% above their next nearest rivals, Fine Gael.

As for Fianna Fáil; well they’re ahead of Sinn Fein anyway.

That’s good news for them, right?

These results were mirrored when we asked the question, “Which politician would you like to see as the next Taoiseach?” Surprise, surprise; Comrade Gilmore stole almost 30% of the vote again, showing

that Trinity students are firmly in Labour’s corner for the next election. More intriguingly, Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan is only 6% away from Gilmore’s lead suggesting that the discontent with the soldiers of destiny is not comprehensive.

In recent months, it has appeared that Lenihan has been the keystone that is keeping the whole Fianna Fail house of cards from disintegrating into political flotsam. So maybe it is no wonder that the ailing Minister is looking like a diamond in the rough. On the other hand one has to wonder how many Hist members voted for their former librarian. Biffo is looking rather deflated, coming in at 3.8%, the lowest in the poll.

Cowen has taken a battering in the polls recently and if he was looking for sympathy from Trinity students in this poll, he was clearly very misguided indeed.

But forget the politicians;

forget the parties and the ard fheiseanna and the electioneering. We wanted to get a better sense of what kind of person you think should lead this country. We wanted to know what qualities you think should be brought to the role of Taoiseach and what non political figure you thought would be able to meet the requirements and match the standards that the job demands. The person you thought would best lead this country out of recession and back into the economic driving seat was our esteemed Ents officer, Mr Darragh Genockey. The students of Dublin University have spoken; we want to session through the recession. We don’t need to worry about economic indicators and tax, as long as we have 3 quid drinks and the odd beer bong we’re sound. I’m inclined to agree with this logic myself. Want to stimulate the economy? It’s nothing a few cheap vodkas and red bulls

can’t fix. Let’s get behind Genockey’s stimulus package. On the other hand the runners up include write-in candidates such as public intellectual, Louis Walsh and, as one student wrote, “Gorgeous George Hook, aka The Right Hook, aka dreamboat extraordinaire.” I think we’ll stick with Genockey.

At the end of the day there are still those of us who are still skeptical about Ireland’s new political landscape. We stopped some students on the cobbles and asked them if they thought that Labour’s new position heralded anything new for Ireland’s political topography. The answers were varied. Ciaran, a junior freshman studying Geography and physics told us, “at this stage I think they’re all the same. Take the example of the greens. Everyone thought they were going to do something different and look where that got us.”

This sense of disillusionment is

permeating every layer of Irish society.

Yet still, a full 80% of students plan to vote in the next election. Gerard, a 4th year physics student, is not sure if Labour’s new position has anything to do with party policy.

He says that, “people are more impressed with Gilmore as a leader than they are with the Labour party or any of their policies.” So is this perceived swing in the polls to the left bolstered by a lack of choice or is it indeed a fundamental shift in the Irish psyche? I’m inclined to agree with Emma, a second year BESS student, when she says that, “Labour is something new.” Whatever the case, even if a Fine Gael-Labour coalition cant get us out of this mess, I for one think its time to hand over the reins and let someone else try their luck at the roulette wheel.

Your view: Tomás Sullivan takes to the concourse Gerard SS Physics Are you affiliated with any political party?

No Are you aware of Labour’s current lead in the polls?

Yes Do you think that Labour’s new position heralds anything new for Irish politics, such as a clearer left/right policy divide?

No, I don’t think so, I think people are more impressed with Gilmore as a leader than they are with the Labour party or any of their policies.

Ciaron JF Geography and Physics Are you affiliated with any political party?

No Are you aware of Labour’s current lead in the polls?

Somewhat Do you think that Labour’s new position heralds anything new for Irish politics, such as a clearer left/right policy divide?

No, at this stage I just think they’re all the same, take the example of the Greens, everyone thought they were going to do something new and look where that got us.

Mark SS Philosophy

Making sense of it all: Richard Conway shows us the state of the parties

Are you affiliated with any political party?

No Are you aware of Labour’s current lead in the polls?

No Do you think that Labour’s new position heralds anything new for Irish politics, such as a clearer left/right policy divide?

There would be some differences, but nothing huge. At the end of the day people won’t go for radical change and will want something more middle ground.

Lylas and Nahla JS Medicine Are you affiliated with any political party?

No Are you aware of Labour’s current lead in the polls?

Yes Do you think that Labour’s new position heralds anything new for Irish politics, such as a clearer left/right policy divide?

Lylas: Yes it does, this would mean that policies would be more clearly defined and no one would get away with manipulating the system to their advantage. As a member of the general population I’d like to have defined political standings.

Nahla: Yes, I think it would set a clearer divide between left/right policies. But if there was a party with more integrated policies they could take both sides into account.

Nicholas Cano SS European Studies Are you affiliated with any political party?

No Are you aware of Labour’s current lead in the polls?

No, I’m surprised, I’ve always thought Ireland was conservative.

Do you think that Labour’s new position heralds anything new for Irish politics, such as a clearer left/right policy divide?

I would like to say yes but I think Labour’s position is just a sign of current discontent against the government and a lack of credible opposition from Fine Gael. Ireland remains a conservative country at heart.

Emma BESS SF Are you affiliated with any political party?

No Are you aware of Labour’s current lead in the polls?

Yes

Going out: Fionn and Matthew describe two very different nights

We sent out two writers to “Vogue” at Andrews’ Lane Theatre this week - one drunk, one sober. Here they document their differing experiences.

Fionn Fitzpatrick: Locked out of his tree The Pav was wedged and it was a perfect night. I was quite happy to undertake my end of the experiment!

4 for € 8, and so it began. The funniest moment of the night was definitely at this point. Not when someone jumped off the balcony of the Pav into a dumpster of cans, but when my friend got sick from laughing so hard at the scene.

It’s fair to say I almost got sick from laughing at my friend getting sick from laughing.

On to the club! Straight in no problems, although a quick stall at the entrance to see another friend being roughly thrown around by two bouncers. He looked drunk enough for it to be fair enough so we all carried on.

The night from here was about 20

quid’s worth of sugary lady-drinks, and half-conversations with people I otherwise wouldn’t have talked to. I spent most of my time harassing Matt and the girl he successfully charmed. My own pursuit of entertainment was less successful...

The banter was decent despite everything, and an appearance from some friends I’d been meaning to catch up with saved the night.

A particular highlight was the dance floor. I distinctly remember something slightly self-conscious about Matt’s moves.

At 2:00am things wound down, and with a Subway to cap it all off, I was in a € 20 taxi home.

Money Spent: 50 euro Girl: No Severity of Hangover: 5/10 Overall: 6/10

Matthew Rye: Sober Joe The first thing evident is that I’m going to have to explain to my fellow club-goers the cause of my sobriety at least half a dozen times before they understand. When I mention I’m not drinking for the night, I am met with confused faces and aggressive questions: (“Why the fuck not?”).

As we enjoy the relaxed atmosphere of the Pav, I sense that I am starting to lose the grasp of the conversation. People seem oblivious to completely outrageous comments. They just laugh and move on. More than once I have to say “Sorry, would anybody like to comment on what s/he just said?”

Confused faces follow, accompanied by more aggressive questions. (“Why are you being such a prick?)

The midnight hour approaches.

The drink continues to flow heavily for everyone else. They become more gullible and I begin to rather enjoy myself. An intoxicated fellow is beguiled into jumping into a bin from a balcony at the promise of alcohol. Desperate, yet very entertaining. I enquire into the health of the young individual. More faces and questions. I am sensing a theme here. Best to go with the flow.

The club beckons: The floor is absolutely filthy. I go to the bar to order a soft drink, but alcohol is actually cheaper. I feel conned. I spend most of the evening away from the dance floor in an effort to more comfortable. I would be enjoying it so more if the music was just a tiny bit softer.

It’s now time to fall flat on my

face with embarrassment and attempt to chat up some girls. I don’t even have the self-confidence to do this when I’m drunk. It goes surprisingly well. They seem to be amazed by my broad vocabulary and flawless speech.

In Subway, reminiscing about the nights events. I don’t think I’ve missed much by deciding not to drink. Marks off for the dirty club and the constant barrage of hugs I received from drunken, sweaty friends. Being able to get up at 8 the next day is a positive.

Money spent: c. 15 euro Girl: Yes Severity of Hangover: None at all Overall : 7/10

Do you think that Labour’s new position heralds anything new for Irish politics, such as a clearer left/right policy divide?

I do think there would be a difference: Fine Gael and Fianna Fail are both the same but Labour to me is something new.

Niamh and Rachel JF Science Are you affiliated with any political party?

No Are you aware of Labour’s current lead in the polls?

Niamh: Yes Rachel: No Do you think that Labour’s new position heralds anything new for Irish politics, such as a clearer left/right policy divide?

Niamh: I’m not sure but people will probably go back to Fianna Fail and Fine Gael.

Rachel: They’re all unpopular, I think Labour are just the least unpopular right now.

Photos: Apoorv Vyas

7

The University Times | Tuesday, October 19th 2010

TimesFeatures

Teaching and Research: a question of balance Deputy News Editor Rónán Burtenshaw takes a broader look at the questions raised by his article on replacement lecturers The practice of replacement teaching and teaching buyouts was detailed in this issue’s lead story. To some it might be worrying; others will celebrate an increase in the practice as indicating the College’s strong standing as a research university. But this increase did not occur in a vacuum, and it raises a fundamental question for the modern university; what is the value of teaching?

Our investigation uncovered examples of Professors being replaced in their teaching jobs by contract lecturers not in possession of PhDs. It heard of senior academics whose jobs are almost entirely devoid of teaching undergraduates. It compared the money being paid to those replacement lecturers with the cost to students of the modules they teach and with the notional cost of the teaching portion of senior academic’s salaries. The picture it painted was of a climate where the practice of teaching was being disincentivised and devalued.

This is not to say that those

who have been brought in as contract lecturers are any worse at teaching than those they replaced. Anecdotally, students will give many examples of how younger, newer staff will be more committed to teaching and invest more time in their modules.

But senior academic figures were hired, at least in part, because they excelled in their fields and had experience of teaching. This cannot be said of many who have come to replace them, regardless of the qualities that they bring to the table.

A comparison was made between the amount paid to contract lecturers and the academics they stand to replace in the lead story. Given those numbers, it is hard to deny that College places a lower value on the teaching of the replacements.

It would appear that College’s model for an academic, still referred to as the teacher-scholar model in the Strategic Plan, necessitates a careful balance. In this model it is accepted that academics conducting research is of benefit to undergraduate students as well. This follows thinking from the international academic community that lecturers who are more engaged in substantial research are more aware of contemporary material in their field and also more

able to write their own.

That argument stands to reason until such a time as senior academics are no longer accessible to undergraduates. The “tipping point” referenced in the lead story comes when the time spent researching leaves much fewer, if any, time for undergraduate teaching.

The worry is that this is going to become more like the established practice. A climate of prioritising research exists in the College, and for some very understandable reasons.

League tables, for instance, like QS or the Times Higher Education (THE), place a higher weighting on quality of and output from research than comparable qualities of teaching. These rankings are important in various ways, not least of which attracting overseas students and postgraduates, which are potentially lucrative.

Improving Trinity’s standing as a research university can also have trickle-down effects. It can add esteem to the College, which helps graduates with Trinity degrees. The money brought in by research can higher standards in the areas in question. It can also bring interest in College positions from more renowned academics. This influx of cash provides a contrast to the currently frugal state sector which provides the university’s grant.

But this new emphasis, meant to expand on the structure of Trinity’s reputation, may well end up using material from its foundations. A model of university teaching exists in College that involves academics getting to know students over a four-year period and having an investment in them.

Trinity’s comparatively small class sizes and increased specialisation in latter years gives students closer access to their lecturers and academics a greater idea of students’ strengths and weaknesses.

They may even be asked to assess those when writing a reference, a task that will become harder to do accurately or comprehensively if they meet students for only one or two years.

To a large degree, Trinity College’s esteem is based on the quality of its graduates. A degree from the university is seen as the highest qualification of its level in Irish education.

The vast majority of the student body are Irish and most choose Trinity not because of its position in a league table of world universities, but because it has a reputation of offering the best education in Irish third-level.

This differs from universities higher up in the QS or THE rankings. Harvard and Yale are arguably more renowned for

the research work of their academics than the level of their education. It would be difficult to make that case for Trinity.

But they are also better funded, more able to balance research and teaching with their greater resources.

Trinity College is attempting to restructure and move forward. However, efforts to add esteem to the university through senior academics spending greater amounts of time on research could jeopardise undergraduate teaching.

Academics have always taken time off teaching to engage in research and go on sabbatical. But when this expands, and is incentivised to do so, undergraduate teaching stands to suffer.

This is especially the case when the system of replacement offers few quality-control guarantees. The growth of casualised or outsourced academic labour is a risk.

Teaching and research are the two most important roles of the modern university. Their marriage can often be an uncomfortable one. It is a delicate balance, and a question of scale.

Time for a change of tack on drugs Tommy Gavin Deputy Editor The results of the University Times survey on drug use by Trinity students will come as a surprise to some. To most it will not, nor should it. Drug use by students is not a phenomenon exclusive to Trinity and certainly not to Dublin, I would be surprised if the results of a poll conducted in UCD were significantly different. That over half of students have used cannabis within the last year is predictable. They know anecdotally, from the media, and from experience that the more hyperbolic claims about the effects of illegal drugs are nonsense, which only encourages experimentation. It is true that chemically, cannabis is no more addictive than chocolate, but chocolate is not banned outright by the state despite the links with gum disease and diabetes. Alcohol and tobacco are better analogues though, as they can be addictive and more obviously life threatening. While it is cliché to point out the comparatively benign health detriments of cannabis and mdma with alcohol and tobacco, it is far from the most

compelling argument for drug policy reform.

Nor is the economic argument which holds that simply by having a prohibition, we create a market that encourages crime and exploitation.

As we inflate the price of drugs by limiting the supply to the black market, there is added incentive to engage in violent crime to make a profit in the drug trade, as Al Capone did in 1920’s Chicago with alcohol. It too was banned for moral reasons, but it became clear that the cure was worse then the disease. As Raymond Kendall, Secretary General of Interpol put it in January 1994; “All penalties for drug users should be dropped...making drug abuse a crime is useless and even dangerous...Every year we seize more and more drugs and arrest more and more dealers, but at the same time the quantity available in our countries still increases...

Police are losing the drug battle worldwide.” No, for all its merit, the micro-economics of the situation are not the most important reason to reform Irish drug policy.

Even the crucial macro-economic reason is not the most

important despite its credibility, the argument that Ireland cannot presently afford to lose money to the underground economy and waste resources trying to police it. It was primarily this argument that drove California to Proposition 19, which will be voted on in November. Under this law, the sale of cannabis will remain illegal, but people may possess of up to 28 grams by people over 21. This would be to be taxed by the state at $50 which could generate $1.6 billion a year in new revenue, helping California’s projected budget deficit of $40 billion, similar to Ireland’s projected €40 billion.

No, the reason there must be drug policy reform in Ireland is because the University Times survey suggests that over half of Trinity students are supposedly engaging in criminal activity. Activity that doesn’t itself hurt anybody else, that can be on their own time in their own home. We are to believe that they are criminals. If indeed over half of Trinity Students are criminals, then it is by arbitrary definition, and that definition needs to change.

aa

Technology: Facebook

The Social Network fulfils our deepest desires Emma Dunne examines the psychological traits that make Facebook so attractive to our generation

Facebook Facts: Compiled by Rachel Thompson

How very unfriendly

The global ascendancy of Facebook is perhaps best demonstrated through the New Oxford American Dictionary’s 2009 Word of the Year - ‘unfriend‘.

And while this sparked some debate as to whether the more accurate term would in fact be ‘defriend’, the definition, at least, was unambiguous: “to remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook”.

B

oasting a global membership of over 500 million, translated into more than 70 languages worldwide, and now the subject of a major motion picture that hit Irish cinemas this week, Facebook, it seems, is here to stay.

By now it is fair to say that the site is almost de rigueur for ‘Generation Y’, as the current consignment of 19 to 29 year olds have come to be known, and with the TCD network alone claiming over 14,000 members, it is clear that Trinity students are no exception.

It is likely that this will come as no surprise to us students who see more of our Facebook profile than we do of our lecturer’s face during the average class. However, how often do we stop to think about what the phenomenal popularity of social networking sites such as Facebook or the ill-fated Bebo say about us as a generation?

Unsurprisingly, this is not a question that has escaped the attention of some of the world’s foremost psychologists and social commentators, and a plethora of possible explanations have been advanced in an attempt to explain our vociferous appetite for such sites.

At the most basic level, it has been suggested that Facebook’s popularity rests on the simple fact that it quenches our natural human desire to engage in what psychologists politely term ‘social surveillance’.

In other words, it satisfies our nosiness. But surely this alone cannot explain the site’s attractiveness. After all, Facebook is about much more than passively observing what others are up to. A central feature of the site is that it encourages active interaction between users, allowing people to create personal profiles, upload photos of themselves and send messages to friends, meaning that in practice, the site is as much about self projection as it is about people-watching.

Other researchers have

Putting a price on friendship

Your own personal number of Facebook friends may be a cause of shame, pride or ridicule. But in 2009, Burger King placed a value of roughly 37 American cents on the average Facebook friendship. Their Whopper Sacrifice incentive rewarded users with a free ‘Angry Whopper’ (retail price $3.69) for publicly deleting 10 friends…who would then receive a blunt message informing them that they were deleted for a free burger.

Stung rapid being happy

The issue of privacy is one of the major concerns surrounding Facebook today - and 29-year-old Nathalie Blanchard certainly learned the hard way to be wary of what she posted on her page. The Canadian IBM employee had been on long-term sick leave for a year and a half after being diagnosed with major depression, but her monthly payments were stopped after she posted pictures on her profile that her employers deemed “too cheerful”.

Apply yourself suggested that our love of Facebook lies in the fact that by allowing us to create and maintain profiles, it gives us an opportunity to craft an idealised version of ourselves, and to present this wittier, pithier, shinier edition to the world.

Here we can allow our virtues to take centre stage whilst choosing to omit details of our less meritorious traits.

However, this premise has also been questioned. Recently, researchers in Texas tested the theory by objectively measuring the personalities of participants and comparing the results to their pre-existing profiles on Facebook. Perhaps surprisingly, the results showed that rather than creating rose-tinted versions of themselves online, the majority of those studied had in fact fashioned profiles that reflected the reality of their personalities, warts and all.

So what is it about the site that we seem to find so addictive? Another possible explanation that has been advanced is that our insatiable appetite for Facebook is attributable to simple insecurity. A team of

researchers at York University in Ontario, Canada recently examined this link. They found that that there is a high correlation between the number of times that a person checks their Facebook profile per day and traits such as low self esteem and narcissism. Applied to Irish teens today, is it possible that this theory could go at least some way towards illuminating the reasons for our love of social networking sites?

On the surface, this perhaps seems an unlikely proposition. After all, we are the generation that was weaned on the fruits of Ireland’s most lucrative Celtic Tiger years. By and large, we are well-travelled, well read, and have benefitted from the finest education that the state has to offer. We have also been fortunate enough to experience the unprecedented freedom of a society in which previously formidable obstacles to opportunity (for example, those of nationality, gender and social class) are being dismantled at an ever-increasing rate. In the face of this, how could this generation possibly be said to be afflicted with any

sort of low self esteem or insecurity?

Perhaps the suggestion is not as far fetched as it first appears.

Recent statistics confirm that teen depression is on the rise, and it is estimated that up to 15% of adolescents aged 13 – 21 will experience serious depressive episodes at some stage.

Orla McHugh, psychotherapist and author of ‘Celtic Cubs – Inside the Mind of the Irish Teenager’, attributes this to the seismic changes that Irish society has undergone in recent years.

In her experience with young people, she has found that “because a lot of the support structures that [they] had before are not the same, they are far more insecure than ever before”.

If this is true, then as the researchers at York University hypothesised, perhaps simple insecurity could go some way towards explaining our generation’s appetite for social networking sites. As McHugh states, many of the structures that once so rigidly shaped the lives of those that came before us – such as the social constraints of gender or the pervasive power of religion - have

crumbled in recent years. As is consistent with human nature, when faced with unprecedented levels of uncertainty, we look for support, for guidance and reassurance. Perhaps sites like Facebook have become an integral part of our lives as it is through these sites that we affirm who we are. We can list our friends, our interests, our hobbies. Such sites allow us to define ourselves in the way that society now refuses to. We reduce our lives, our personalities and our relationships to a page of text, and by doing so we seek to cast an anchor in a society that seems determined to send us adrift.

If McHugh is correct, perhaps it is symptomatic of the anomie that this generation feels that we cling so desperately to anything that gives us the stability and reassurance that society (for all its talk of opportunity and prospects) seems to have forgotten to provide.

Or maybe the other theorists are right - maybe we’re just nosy after all.

We may have all scraped through the college application process, but Facebook is responsible for many others being less lucky. In a recent survey of 500 top American colleges, 10% of admissions officers admitted looking at the social networking site as a means of evaluating applicants - and 38% of these said that what they saw negatively affected the candidate.

Zuckerberg’s inaccurate Info

Mark Zuckerberg, creator of Facebook, is arguably the most famous Harvard dropout since Bill Gates - why, then, did he think he would get away with listing himself as a Harvard graduate on his own profile page? When questioned on this during an interview, Zuckerberg simply replied, “We don’t have a setting for dropout.” Neatly avoiding the fact that he must have the power to make that happen…

c u in court 2mo x

Facebook has even infiltrated the legal systems of Australia and New Zealand. The precedent for this was set when a couple were notified that they were losing their house after defaulting on a loan via the social networking site, and court notices are now allowed to be served in this manner if all other means of communication have been exhausted. Similarly a Facebook summons is considered legally binding!

8

Tuesday, October 19th 2010 | The University Times

TimesFeatures

Celebrity posturing on aid has its purpose Meleesha Bardolia and Paul Kelly attended The Hist’s recent Aid Debate.

The kerfuffle surrounding Bob Geldof’s presence on campus made them wonder: does celebrity interference in aid do more harm than good?

The GMB was buzzing with excitement. Three quarters of an hour before the debate was due to begin, the queue had already begun to snake out past the front doors. In this, The Hist’s 241st session, an incendiary debate was being hosted between students and a guest panel featuring Sir Bob Geldof, Ugandan policymaker Yash Tandon, and Director of Trócaire Justin Kilcullen. The proposition: “This house believes that Development Aid Has Done More Harm Than Good.”

As the chamber room was opened, everybody flooded in, desperate to get a seat. The debate wouldn’t start for another hour yet. However, the verbal brawl that was to ensue between Geldof and Tandon would transform the oak table of dialogue into a stage of sparked passions. The insidious whispered asides, the glisten of fame-hungry eyes, and ‘awkward-turtle’ hand gestures performed by the audience drolly suggested that maybe the house issue should be whether or not celebrities’ involvement in foreign aid does more harm than good.

Kilcullen acknowledged the superficial stances taken by some in the debate. He admitted that “the temptation” was there for him to speak for the proposition rather than against it. Similarly, Geldof opened his speech by stating that “it’s a tiresome argument and the

problem is that I agree with so much of the opposition.”

Despite this temptation, however, Kilcullen enumerated some edifying points from the opposition’s point of view such as the simple fact that there isn’t enough aid. Using the example of Ireland as a “successful aid story”, he showed how the Irish state received “€47 billion from EU structural funds” in comparison to only €300 billion to the whole continent of Africa in the last 40 years. However, the fact that his initial temptation was to lean towards pessimism rather than optimism suggests that maybe we do need that glimmer of fantasy provided by celebrities within the dark, desperate chambers of policymaking to keep us sanguine, to spur us on. Cue Bob Geldof.

Recent articles on stars’ involvement in humanitarian causes chastise celebrities for using the vulnerability of poverty to advance their own personae. However, articles that are merely bent on creating caricatures of celebrities as opportunists are as two dimensional as the stereotypes they fabricate. Both sides clearly cared deeply about the debate that surrounds development aid. This fact was made plain by Tandon, who confessed: “For me, it’s life.”

For Tandon, aid acts as a “distraction” to the more important issues of unfair trade and the asymmetrical structure of

Cabaireacht Buimbiléara Bhí sraith do chláracha ar RTÉ le déanaí inár ndearna siad iarracht léargas a thabhairt ar shaol seandaoine in Éirinn. Ón méid a chonaic mé, theip glan orthu. as Pádraig Schaler

Bob Geldof arrives to rapturous applause, in stark contrast to his little-known . Photo: Kevin O’Rourke the world economy. It also creates a situation where “people don’t take Africa seriously”- a situation intensified by the celebrity culture that has grown up around aid. This celebrity culture was brought sharply into relief when the psychedelic pink shirt of Geldof emerged to tumultuous applause - far more than the Ugandan economist received.

Geldof then proceeded to lash out against Tandon, claiming that his economic theories “haven’t really worked out or Africa would be booming.”

However throughout Geldof’s speech, the atmosphere of the room felt more like he was back at Live Aid than he was in a debate. Within moments, his verve and charisma had taken over and it was this that won the debate decidedly for the opposition. However, even as he crooned at the audience with his convictions about how the placement of a euro in a box equates a deep political act, the only image reminiscent of the glimmer of a coin was the flash of students’ cameras.

Once the debate concluded,

Geldof and Tandon bent their heads in a solemn admission that the duel was over. The performative quality of their farewell suggested that the curtain had fallen and these political activists were merely taking their final bows and returning to reality. But did this debate really raise awareness about the deeper issues of development aid, or does the over-promotion of aid by celebrities such as Geldof result in only a superficial exploration of one of the deepest questions of our time?

At the end of the day, did this

debate really question how African economies may be better developed, or was this just an opportunity for the Hist to get a rock star to come visit Trinity? However, maybe the celebrities and their performative posturing are necessary. After all, if the world wasn’t a stage, if Geldof and Tandon weren’t merely players with their entrances and exits, there would be no audience. And without an audience spurred on by the reigns of rhetoric, there can be no potential for change.

Freshers’ Week in pictures

Clockwise from top left: Fight Like Apes at the Freshers’ Ball, a new Freshers’ Week dawns, a student tries before she buys, the age-old GMB rivalry continues, An Cumann Gaelach show you the way, LawSoc member retains his/her right to privacy. Photos: Dargan Crowley-Long

Tá mo sheanmháthair i dteach altranais agus gach uair a théim isteach tagann gruaim orm. Tá bean sa seomra in aice le mo sheanmháthair a bhíonn ag beicíal gan stad go héadóchascach, ní féidir léi a seomra a fhágáil, bíonn anó uirthi gach aon nóiméad dá saol agus níl rud ar bith gur féidir a dhéanamh di ach feitheamh ar uair a báis. Sin an rud atá ar siúl ag fórmhór na ndaoine ar úrlár mo sheanmháthar sa teach altranais sin - ag fanacht go dtí go stopann inneall a ngluaisteáin. Is áit duairc í agus cé go ndéanann an fhoireann san áit a ndícheall, níl mórán gur féidir a dhéanamh leis na daoine a gcónaíonn ann a múscailt.

Suíonn muintir an úrláir atá in ann a leaba a fhágáil i seomra caidrimh don chuid is mó den lá. Reachtáiltear an lá timpeall ar na béilte agus ar Choróin Mhuire agus ar chúirt na gclainne má tá an t-ádh ar an duine. Bíonn an teilifís ar súil ach ní bhreathníonn duine ná deora air. Is san áit bhán a mbreathnaíonn siad. Tá bean amháin ag fulaingt go dona leis an meabhairghalar, bíonn sí ag caint gan staonadh gan stad gan dealramh le duine ar bith - ach tá sí sásta. Sílim go minic gurbh é sin an tslí is fearr le bheith san áit sin. Caithfidh go gcuireann sé brón ar chroíthe a gclann í a fheiceáil mar sin ach is fearr sin ná í a bheith ag fulaingt le paranóia ar nós mo sheanmháthar a ceapann go bhfuil gach duine ag cur comhcheilge ar bun ina coinne. Ón méid a chonaic mé níor léirigh RTÉ an taobh sin den seanaois, tá daoine ann ar nós na ndaoine a bhí le feiceáil ar an gclár a chonaic mé ar RTÉ atá folláin agus lán le fuinneamh agus spraoi, ach tá daoine ann nach bhfuil an t-ádh sin orthu. Tá t-uasfás taithí ag na seandaoine seo, mhair siad trí dhá chogadh domhanda, Cogadh Cathartha, neamhspléachas na hÉireann agus Italia ‘90 - is éacht é má tá siad fós sláintiúil i ndiaidh 95 bliain. Ag deireadh an lae, is áiteanna gruama iad tithe altranas, fágann na daoine i mbosca.

Cibé cumas atá agat agus tú ag druidim le bualadh leis an slánaitheoir, an rud is tabhachtaí ná go gcaitear na blianta deireanacha de do shaol i slí mhaorga. Mar a dúirt RTÉ, ‘Because getting old is part of life’ tá an sean aois in ann dúinn uilig.

9

The University Times | Tuesday, October 19th 2010

TimesOPINION

Letters

We’re all in the ‘RA

to the Editor

Letters should be posted to “The Editor, The University Times, House 6, Trinity College” or sent by email to letters@universitytimes.ie We cannot guarantee that all letters will be published. Letters may be edited for length and/or style.

Library hours will hurt Schol candidates Sir, I have just been informed that the library will not be open from the 23rd of December till the 4th of January. Anyone that will be sitting Scholarship Examinations that begin on the 10th of January will most certainly suffer from these refined opening hours.

Is it me, or has the administration in Trinity once again overlooked the fact that they have changed the terms and that exam timetables cannot sort themselves out?

We all know that availing of the 24 hour study area can only be as productive as the amount of books you have. It looks like Trinity will take another “let’s see how it goes this year” approach to things.

Yours etc., Ciarán Traynor SF BESS

No recognition for student publishing Sir, Dean of Students Gerry Whyte’s email of 5 October announcing the new roll of honour recognising extra-curricular activity sadly made no mention of student publishing. This ignores the thousands of hours of voluntary activity that students complete every year on behalf of all the publications in this College -- at least 10 that I can think of.

In my report to the Dean on my intermission of studies, granted to me in 2008 in order to edit Trinity News, I put on the record my gratitude to him and to the College for their behind-the-scenes material and financial support for student publishing. The omission of publishing from this new scheme gives the impression that the College would rather forget about this support.

So come on, Gerry. It’s time to own up – the College’s support has bred some fantastic journalists. Let’s recognise their efforts alongside their society and sporting colleagues.

Yours, etc., Martin McKenna SS Biochemistry

Fees are the only answer Sir, We should reintroduce third-level fees, or at least a bigger contribution to be put forth by those who wish to go to University. Now, this won’t make me many friends and will probably make me a villain.

That’s ok in this case. The SUs certainly won’t like it. As for FEE, well, I’ve never been a fan of rampant violence to begin with.

Now, I am attending university on a Bank of Ireland Millennium Scholarship and am also on a grant which ensures that I do not need to pay the Student registration fee. I am in no way rich and my family are not wealthy. So why the stance?

It goes without saying that we are in a time of severe financial hardship, with the country teetering on the brink of financial annihilation.

There is only so much money in the public coffers to finance everything and universities are feeling the pinch as much as we are. Take NUIG, for example, where in my course tutorials can only be offered for core subjects because it is too costly to hire tutors for all of them.

It is quite amazing the quality of education we are getting, when we consider how little funding the universities get. Now imagine a world where we had fees. The universities could be true palaces of learning.

The colossal amount of cash spent on fees could be spent elsewhere and for better reasons. Fees are paid in every other Western Country with a university system of as high a calibre as ours. They produce universities of the standing we could only dream of.

It may seem unfair to you that you should pay for your own education but sometimes you need to invest in yourself. We do it all the time with postgraduates, why not do it with the base degree too?

Yours, etc.,

Mr Chrome of the Rubberbandits reads out his list of people he claims are in the IRA at The Phil, including Papa Smurf, Al Pacino and John McCain. Photo: Tom Lowe

Student’s View: Darragh Haugh

I’m not going to lie to you. I’m not getting any.

I

n the first month of this college year over 3,500 condoms were handed out by both the Students Union and Societies. However, the sad truth is that most of these plastic sheets will be condemned to a life within your wallet or bedside table. Despite the rumours no one in college gets that much sex. Don’t be fooled by the dance floor and dark corners of Doyle’s, nobody scores that much. In fact Irish people average only 11 sexual partners in a life time, which means a lot less than three people a year during college. So if Ireland is realistically still a sexually conservative society why do we feel constantly pressured to get our bit?

The easy option is the media where sex is used to sell everything from shampoo to shoes or maybe it’s evolutionary but that would only go so far. The real problem has got to be the amount of lies we tell each other and ourselves about sex. Honestly most of us come to college with relatively little sexual experience ranging from that

awkward time in the back of the car to that awkward time in that free house, yet we all act like we’ve seen it all. For men, a frank conversation about sex rarely extends past “guess what I got last night” or the brief hushed mention of a rash over a can of Bav. Women, on the other hand, are far more quiet on the subject unless they are unfairly branded a slut for expressing themselves (and to be honest if I knew what women thought I wouldn’t be writing about sex).

One of the few times where honest discussion of our nocturnal habits is encouraged is during S.H.A.G. week. Daily events and talks take place in the hope on shedding some light and dispelling the rumours but as always the message won’t reach everyone. The heavy handed theme and the overflow of condoms simply act as a hook to get you interested so you’ll actually learn something. Recently I took an exam to test my sexual awareness and the changing room banter can really leave you lacking. For some, and myself in previous

Conor T. Keane

Final Year Law, NUIG

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years included, have had the message lost and simply see it only as a week were an extra special effort must be made to get with some complete random person in Coopers. From personal experience I can tell you that an entire night spent doing nothing but hunting any willing member of the opposite sex will be one of the worst you can have regardless of the outcome.

I am in no way advocating a life of celibacy and evenings spent watching high school musical while alphabetising your Jonas Brothers CD collection. Expression of sexuality is a cornerstone of most peoples’ college years. We’re young and stupid so you‘ll never have more fun with your body then now, but don’t be under the illusion that everyone is out getting laid as you read this.

Even the most charismatic and charming of us will spend the vast majority of nights in bed alone. Getting with some random person in a club can be fun but we all know that it’s a lot better when you actually like

the person. It’s unrealistic to assume that every person you end up with is going to be the love of your life but it couldn’t you to at least know their name and maybe have spoken to them while sober once or twice.

If not, try and at least be a safe, which goes a little bit further then using protection.

Welfare Officer Steph Flemming summed it best, “if you come out of college with no sexual regrets you’re doing well. If you feel like you’re going to regret something the next morning, its best not to do it at all. You can always just say no. This is equally important for men and women.”

We’re all here for some fun and we all have the best intentions, however its worth it for at least a moment to make sure it’s something that you want.

10

Tuesday, October 19th 2010 | The University Times

TimesEDITORIAL

The University Times The demise of research-led teaching A

sad irony of College’s continuing battles with the Higher Education Authority and the Department of Education is that as time passes, Trinity becomes less of an educational institution with a strong reputation for research, and more and more a research institution where 17,000 people go to lectures and sit exams from time to time.

The results of the investigation printed in this paper, in which one of our reporters

spoke to numerous high-ranking academics about the practice of replacement teaching, speak for themselves. More and more, College is incentivising its academic staff to give up on lecturing and go into full-time research, leaving their classes to be taught by if not unqualified, then at least under-qualified PhD students and contract lecturers.

Teaching has truly taken a back seat to research in this College, as we seek to climb

those oh-so-vital University Rankings, which place such a focus on citations and research output. Of course, apart from prestige, one of the main reasons why these rankings are so important to College is that they attract international students, who usually have a little bit more cash to throw around than our destitute government. These poor unfortunate rubes from abroad, duped into thinking that they will learn from the huge research

experience of their lecturers, often find themselves being taught by inexperienced, underpaid replacement lecturers.

Students are the lifeblood of this university. They are the reason for its existence.

Yet, time and time again, the decisionmakers cast our needs aside in favour of more research, more money, and more distance between students and academics.

We are here to learn, and we want to

Have you got the shift yet? more ‘hands on’ experience.

There is the post-Shift chemistry, dependant on the relative level of awkwardness between Shifter and Shiftee in the following morning’s lectures.

Indeed, much of Shift culture is dependent on the characters it creates: the resident paparazzo, armed with trigger flash to catch even the most fleeting brush of lips, the serial intra-class Shifter, the ‘God loves a tryer’ and the Amnesiac (“Did I Shift him?

Nah… couldn’t

Seán McGrenaghan

A

year of study abroad status within the hallowed teaches a man many walls of Trinity. I made the things. Just under two mistake of mentioning this months spent in the sleepy prospect to a Junior Sophister Southern town of Lexington, philosophy student who took Virginia has expanded my culcontention, “It’s better than tural horizons, broadened my religion. Religion is divisive, world view and reaffirmed my man. The Shift unites. I shiftloyalty to a particular brand of ed some bird in Science last cut-price Dutch beer. night. It made me see beyond Most of all, it has taught me the Hamilton, beyond the Arts that we Irish have a unique apBlock. By the end of it, I didn’t proach to re- la tions with even care that she was wearing the opposite sex. hiking boots.”

The Shift The Shift, it (and seems is much The Shift is a subsemore than a kiss. phenomenon quent If it were just Drift) is a phe- that is peculiar to that, life around nomenon that Trinity would be Ireland and one is peculiar to far less Ireland and one that is inherently interestthat is inherently ing. The exportable exportable.

Shift is Dragged from popularthe agricultural obscurity of ized not simply by the ‘the Shticks’ by the current act but by the culture that surJunior Sophister year, the Shift rounds it – after all, a kiss is has exploded onto the Trinity just a kiss. It is the culture that social scene with unstoppable surrounds the Shift that is the force. real reason for the obsession.

In the words of the Law Society Each class has its own apAuditor, Grace O’Malley, “its proach, but the fundamental true…it seems that the Shift is elements of Shift culture are now bigger than Jesus. I myself universal. There is the traam gagging for it.” ditional hunting ground, be Indeed, it seems that the Shift that D2, Basebar or Coppers has achieved a quasi-religious for those who seek a slightly

One lusty Law Soc member’s “Shift List” from the recent “Sue Me Or Screw Me” event which drew the attention of College authorities for its “vulgarity”. Photo: Dargan Crowley Long

concept of Shift and drift was alien to the people of rural Virginia.

Indeed, the very idea of photographing the act and tagging both parties’ respective friends on Facebook was actively frowned upon. In possession of such a lucrative asset and with a relatively untapped market to exploit, the Irish contingent in America has set about the process of education.

Thus far, the Irish influence has ensured that students originating from as far apart as Copenhagen and Colorado have replaced “...it seems that term ‘making the Shift is now the have.”). out’ with ‘gettin’ A name could bigger than Jesus” the Shift’. be assigned to The soeach title for - Grace O’Malley cially proevery class in gressive the college. There is hardly a nature of the Shift man or woman in Trinity who has also been addoes not revel in Shift culvanced, having been used thus ture. It is the ultimate spectafar to break down divisions of tor sport. colour, creed and in some casIn fact, such is the all-encomes even attractiveness. passing nature of the Shift in Steadily, the Shift in all its glory Trinity, permeating the very is being preached to the people fabric of the institution, that I of America. The Irish are once had expected a similar culture again making an indelible to be in existence in univermark on those across the pond. sities around the globe. This Who knows, one day the Shift unfortunately is not quite the may form part of the Guinness case. On landing in America, and Leprechaun infused IrishI quickly realized that while American ideal. They’re gagkissing was perfectly acceptging for it. They just don’t know able, the Shifting culture was it yet. insufficiently evolved. The

Mid term elections will be a trial by fire for Democrats Eye on America

Jack Farrell

T

his November marks the first set of elections since Obama assumed control of the Oval Office. A campaign based on ‘hope’ looked set to translate into a productive presidency, but an ailing economy and the re-emergence of true conservatism has led to a difficult half-term and these election results should show that Americans are, once again, seeking change.

For two years the Democrats have controlled the legislative branches and executive branch of government. The failure to restore the economy to its former glory as well as a revolution within right-wing America

have made for a tumultuous two years in American politics. Being in opposition has allowed the Republican Party time to sit back and watch the Democrats struggle to fix America. Republicans have failed to cultivate a strategy that would inspire the voters, many of whom have become disillusioned by their impotent politics of the last few years, but they haven’t needed to. The still ailing economy has provided a platform from which these elections should be won.

On the other hand, these elections could not have come at a worse time for the Democrats. They have put in place

plans which will need time to truly show their benefits. Yet the American voter wants to see immediate progress, something which the Democrats have failed to provide.

We live in a world where patience is truly a virtue; people pursue their goals in the shortterm because there’s much less risk involved, but they are failing to see that they’re only postponing inevitable problems. US impatience has been the Democrats downfall.

Obama inherited an executive office lacking in respect and in the midst of a severe economic crisis. The American economy had imploded and a long term

plan of action was needed to ensure that the US made a full economic recovery.

The ‘American Recovery and Reinvestment Act’ of 2009 with the American government attempting to reinvigorate the economy with nearly $800 billion is a measure that will take years to reap any substantial rewards and despite saving/ creating over two million jobs, the American people fail to accept anything other than immediate and complete economic recovery as a success.

The Democrats have done a mediocre job, considering that they’re in power at a time of economic crisis. The fact that they are in power at all makes them the easy target for the electorate.

They have become a shell of the enthusiastic party that swept to victory in the 2008 elections on the back of Obama’s campaign. Democrats have put the

needs of the country first, but in doing so they have played in to the hands of the ruthless Republicans, who are quietly waiting in the wings. No innovation is needed by Republicans in this election season, just good old fashioned mudslinging, something which is most evident in the senatorial race in Connecticut.

I may make it sound as though it is a near certainty that the GOP will assume control over the legislative branches come November, but the rise of the reckless and forceful Tea Party movement has added an extra dimension to these elections.

The Tea Party have challenged the Republican status quo, ruffling many feathers with highly publicised and in some cases successful campaigns to date.

Christine O Donnell’s unlikely success in Delaware, defeating the established Republican candidate, highlighted

the divide within the Republican Party, with senior officials now doing all they can to ensure she doesn’t win the seat she‘s after. The Tea Party has unintentionally worked in favour of the Democrats, but the 2010 elections are just too soon for the Tea Party to have a real influence. They are however, definitely capable of making a statement of intent.

This election season will be remembered as the rebirth of fundamentalist conservatism, and will highlight the fight Obama has ahead of him to earn re-election in 2012. The revolution within the ranks of the Republican Party has caused the old lethargic red elephant to be replaced by an entirely different and potentially dangerous animal.

learn: but it seems that nobody wants to teach us. Trinity is suffering a crisis of identity: ir appearsthat many of the powers that be would be far happier if there were no students here at all, just Professors quietly doing their research in echoing, empty buildings. Academics need to ask themselves what the purpose of a university is, and recognise their duty to teach with enthusiasm, care and attention.

The Audacity of Harmon

We need to snip, baby snip to survive

Y

ou owe at least €15,804. As does every other man, woman and child in the country. That’s because €15,804 represents your share of Ireland’s national debt. Of course, by the time you read this you will actually owe more because Ireland, on your behalf, is continuing to borrow €50 million every single day just to keep the lights on.

As a fella wearing a very nice shirt once went on telly to say: “As a nation, we are living away beyond our means.”

Sensibly, the government – and the people we are borrowing the money from - have decided that this can’t go on. And given that you were dumb enough to run up more than fifteen grand in debt without realising it, they have asked some people smarter than you to make some recommendations as to how we are all going to pay it off.

Firstly, they appointed a Commission on Taxation under the former Chairman of the Revenue Commissioners, Frank Daly to make recommendations on our tax system. On the spending side, they asked some economists, accountants and bankers led by Colm McCarthy to make recommendations on public sector expenditure and pay. That group produced what is commonly known as the Bord Snip Nua report.

The government, having been sensible enough to ask people who might actually know what they’re talking about to tell us what to do, then took leave of its senses and totally ignored their recommendations. Worse than that, the Tánaiste, who is in theory the deputy leader of the government, went out of her way to undermine the recommendations of the Bord Snip report by telling the Dáil that many of its suggestions didn’t make sense. She emphasised the word many twice, just to make sure we all got the message.

The opposition haven’t been any better. In January of this year, four months after the Commission on Taxation issued its report, Enda Kenny admitted that his party had yet to discuss a key recommendation contained in the report – the introduction of domestic water charges. He has now clarified that Fine Gael would introduce water charges. The man Mr. Kenny would like to have as his Tánaiste, Eamon Gilmore, appears to also support metered water charges. It is less clear whether he has broken this news to the rest of the Labour Party.

This is madness. Appointing commissions and working groups is meant to give politicians a bit of political cover to introduce unpopular measures.

Instead, in these two instances, they have simply given politicians an excuse to verbally beat up some economists. Unless any of us have forgotten, the country needs to either raise revenue or cut spending to the tune of €4,000 million next year.

Government and opposition have both failed to put forward any better ideas on how to do this than those contained in the Commission on Taxation and Bord Snip reports. Rather than ignoring those documents, they should implement the damn things.

11

The University Times | Tuesday, October 19th 2010

TimesOPINION

We can’t brush off drinking as a “bit of craic” any more Eugene Reavey Deputy Opinion Editor

A

ll you can drink for £25!

As I drive past the gaudy advertisement on a prominent Belfast bar I think, “Most Trinity students would think they’ve died and gone to Heaven,” I muse to myself that perhaps that this is the way forward. The next day an undercover Irish News reporter who attended the night observed, “Watching a young man throwing up in his own hands before slumping against a toilet wall was probably the low point of my night.” I ask myself the question while reading, do we all drink too much? And if so, what combination of factors have coincided to provide alcohol with such a prominent role in our society?

The student culture and the binge drinking among the nation’s youth has come under intense media scrutiny as well as stronger action by the Gardaí. A recent investigative programme on RTÉ pointed the finger at many off-licences in the greater Dublin area for willfully selling alcohol to children under the age of 18.

However, one would have to be naïve to think this pattern is not replicated across the country. As for parents, anecdotal evidence would suggest that they knowingly allow their children to drink a glass of wine or two or a beer in the

home well before their 18th birthday. How can the constant message of the dangers of binge drinking from the Health Authorities be constantly droned out and ignored by the population at large?

The media, it is submitted, must take some blame for this.

The image portrayed everywhere from TV programmes to birthday cards of the highly intoxicated student is constantly bombarded at the nation as the acceptable and indeed the expected pattern of behaviour for a fresh faced student freed from the constraints of his or her parent’s vigilance. The enticing drink offers in bars all over the country reel in the already keen reveller. So the bar makes money, the student gets his fill of cheap drink, and has a lot of fun; everybody wins right? Wrong; many students seem to live with the delusion that as soon as they leave college they will immediately drastically reduce their alcohol consumption. For most this may be possible, however, for the unlucky few, they will develop a dependence that they find increasingly hard to shake.

However, it is not the purpose of this article to come down hard on students and young people. This article asks are we all drinking too much?

A recent study in England

Excessive drinking can lead to difficulties in later life including inappropriate apostrophe placement. Photo: flickr.com/photos/robwatling

I’m mad as hell and I’m not gonna take it anymore

Have you got something to say? Let us know. opinion@universitytimes.ie TimesOPINION

involving every local authority found that the worst rates of dangerous weekly drinking are in some of the country’s most affluent suburbs. The middle aged businessman and woman are consuming 3 or more bottles of wine a week. Hitherto, this was an unseen phenomenon, one not noticed or tackled by the Government. These people are not turning up drunk to casualty, but they are still doing serious damage to their health. So while students shoulder all the criticism in the media for their antics, a middle class epidemic of alcohol dependant professionals has gone largely unnoticed. Much of this will come as no surprise, yet its widespread coverage in the media has suddenly made for an awful lot of uncomfortable reading.

What then can we say about the role of alcohol in our society? It would appear that it has transcended its traditional role as a social crutch. What crutch do two middle aged lawyers need when they each consume a bottle of wine at home every night? What crutch does alcohol provide to the young man passed out on the ground in the middle of a busy city? Are we faced with the conclusion that after a hard weeks work, people simply enjoy the journey of jumping into drunken oblivion, regardless of the adverse affects it has on their health? Will governments spend millions trying to find out what encourages society to

drink so much, only to be faced with the simple retort that, “it’s a bit of craic?”

The Government has already promised reform to fine and punish establishments offering reckless drink promotions that could adversely affect people’s health, however, it is submitted that the problem of the middle class professionals consuming large amounts of alcohol every week provides a much tougher challenge and requires a more subtle approach. A simple rise in the price of alcohol, at least in the short term is unlikely to have any real effect, while adverts showing unsavoury incidents of people fighting on the street are dismissed by the middle class as being inapplicable to them. They might argue that they are harming no one but themselves. As the Government reads the bill for treating alcohol related illnesses that is closing in on the €3 billion mark, they may, however, be inclined to disagree.

Alcohol and its use have long since been established as part of the Irish culture and its abuse is nothing new. A quick look at many of Ireland’s greatest luminaries, poets, sports stars and politicians shows that the problem of alcohol abuse permeates all levels of society.

Are we all drinking too much?

The answer is undoubtedly yes.

How are the government going to successfully tackle this problem? All this scribe can do is shrug his shoulders and wish them the best of luck.

There are no jobs in “Development” Joseph Cummins

C

areers Week, run in college last week by the Careers Advisory Service, offered a wide range of talks on various aspects of the job-hunting process and different employment sectors.

Between items such as ‘CV Writing Skills’ (use spell-check) and ‘Lets get Visible! Managing your online Brand’ (don’t get photographed in compromising positions), a panel seminar on careers in ‘NGOs and Development’ hit upon a rather uncomfortable truth. There are no careers in ‘Development’.

Not simply because of the tight economic times we live in, but because the ‘development’ sector, in any meaningful sense, does not exist.

The seminar on ‘development’ had the highest attendance of all the Careers Week events that I attended. The turnouts for traditional favourites such as ‘Publishing and Journalism’ and postgraduate study options were modest by comparison. Whether or not the starpower activism of Bob Geldof at the Hist debate the night before had buoyed the numbers of those interested, students were in for a rude awakening.

The expert advice was, essentially, to volunteer for a charitable organisation overseas, or get in line for a high-demand, un-paid internship in the Irish civil service. A career in ‘development’ amounts to an administration post in a charity or a position in ‘advocacy’, which equates, one assumes, to something resembling a benevolent PR company. While I certainly don’t intend to belittle the importance of the work that these organisations do, it is insulting to their intelligence, and ours, to pretend that this amounts to ‘development’.

The area of ‘development’ is, of course, always ripe for more research and thus more funding.

Trinity International Development Initiative (TIDI, which is sponsored by Irish Aid) was launched to “expand engagement with research and education on global development,” and Trinity, along with DCU

and other third-level institutions, are now offering postgraduate courses in ‘development’ areas. These courses will prepare students for positions in academia, the media or potentially aid strategy, in the UN for example. All worthwhile options, but none can claim to create ‘development’.

Even programs as convincingly named as the UN ‘Millennium Development Goals’ are primarily about poverty alleviation and securing basic human rights, as well as increasing levels of foreign aid from developed countries. The MDGs are critically important, but as the Western world falls drastically short of their targets - world hunger is still rising, progress on other MDGs slow and uneven - they are closer to charity and disaster relief than selfsustaining ‘development’.

It is of fundamental importance to look for ways to improve the livelihoods of the billions of people who live in poverty. Charity is as necessary and as noble as it ever has been, but it is by its nature a stopgap measure. If the successes of the Western world can teach us anything, it is surely that specialisation, not generalisation, will ultimately prove most useful. ‘Development’ is too broad to be a useful discipline.

Development arises out of well functioning, integrated, secure, productive societies with adequate human and material resources. Its not just social policy, its all policy and much more besides. It is not transferable; it’s organic and indigenous. There are no experts in it. There are no careers in it.

It’s what happens when many of the primary problems are solved.

Perhaps specialists (of all nations) in nutrition, education, the economics of imperfect markets, international trade law, sustainable agriculture and the vast milieu of specialised activities relevant in the third world can eventually, collaboratively, discover it.

12

Tuesday, October 19th 2010 | The University Times

TimesOPINION

Emigration is back as lack of opportunity bites The lack of postgraduation possibilities, coupled with an uninspiring political outlook, means that emigration is an issue once again writes Sehreen Qureshi

Brain Drain; a more common name for human capital flight, and from what I understand, refers to the loss of an intellectually and technically

skilled labour force through the movement of such labour to more favourable geographic, economic, or professional environments. The reasons for this movement can be quite simply divided into two aspects: countries and individuals. Why does any well educated, intellectual leave their home country? Frankly put, it’s because they see a lack of opportunity, organization, and possibly a slightly bewildered economic and political front.

Or maybe they realize there are richer opportunities elsewhere. Over time the definition of this term “brain drain” has become broader. It now

includes educated and professional people, whereas previously it referred only to technology workers, during a time when scientists emigrated to North America from post-war Europe.

My reasoning behind explaining this jargon was to bring us back in time, to see how emigration in search of better opportunities, is not just a twenty first century phenomenon.

Today it’s as easy as picking up a suitcase and printing out your e-ticket to be on your way to a brighter future. However, what’s the guarantee that after a few years of sheer bliss in the UK, the USA, Australia, or

Canada that these places will still need immigrants? In reality, this entire process of movement is a cycle. It has happened before and continues to happen, as workers from all fields, will relocate whenever necessary in search of a better life; usually whatever is best for their pocket.

It is therefore unsurprising that once again people are forced; using that term loosely, to leave their home country. Although this time it’s not professionals or scientists that are leaving, it’s graduates. Believe it or not, it is students, having just received their basic 3rd level degrees, who are now absolutely

sure that emigration is the way forward. Unless you’ve been living underground for the past year you’ll know why. The straightforward answer is simply the lack of jobs. To complicate the matter, the recession, banks going bust and a depressing economic climate have made thousands of graduates reconsider their prospects here in Ireland. According to Bloomberg Business Week, a staggering number of 170,000 jobs vanished last year and the lack of employment is driving an entire generation of graduates away from the country.

For most graduates today,

looking back at their junior freshman years, they would most likely have been exceedingly hopeful for their future careers, and why not? They were well able to obtain their positions at college and so it would be with no bother (except for some strenuous and challenging study), that they would get into a great first job, and as a fresh faced graduate, be willing to take on the world.

Four or five years later and this has all changed. Back then the economy was growing at a rate of 5.4%. The unemployment rate was a mere 4.4%, and construction was booming. Almost all new graduates applying for

jobs received at least an interview from employers fighting enthusiastically over them.

Today graduates are fighting with each other over jobs. The decade long property bubble burst and a sharp decline in the economy led it to shrink by 7.5%. Anything and everything has gone into saving the banks like Anglo Irish, and we, as well as others, are aware of it. David Begg the head of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions also pointed out the exact same thing, when he said “Everything we have is being spent on the banks”. It is estimated that the banking crisis could, or almost has, cost the Irish tax

payers $34 billion.

Subsequently, it’s no revelation that hundreds of people in various hotels are now attending conferences about emigrating down under or across the oceans. We have seen 65,100 people leave the country so far.

The majority of those that decamped were not old immigrants from Eastern Europe.

Some were Trinity graduates, many of whom we know. With unemployment set to hit 13.8% things are sure to get worse and with fewer opportunities at home, growing numbers of Irish people, especially graduates, are also headed for the exit.

Miliband sees opportunity in party crisis Art of crisis Joanne Nolan Eugene Reavey

Here are a few facts to think about: The 2010 budget allocated 166 million Euro to the Arts; a six percent drop from 178 million in 2009. What this means in real terms is that funding for the arts in Ireland amounts to twenty six Euro and seventy seven cents per person per year.

The government may as well just treat us all to a trip to the cinema with popcorn and a drink. Maybe even a Happy Meal afterwards and be done with the arts until 2011 rolls around.

Mary Hanafin recently stated on the website, kildarestreet.com, that her ‘... policy on the arts, culture and film sectors reflects Government Policy in this area as set out in the Programme for Government. This policy is to promote and strengthen the arts in all its forms, increase access to and participation in the arts, make the arts an integral and valued part of our national life, and maximise the potential for cultural tourism. I will endeavour to maximise funding for these sectors, commensurate with their centrality to our economic and social well being.’

Despite these reassurances of doing her best with the resources she is given, the Irish Writers Centre suffered an astounding 100% cut to its funding. Other programmes, nationwide, suffered the same fate. As usual it is the ‘have not’s’ who will suffer most. Access to facilities has become a two tier system which reduces participation to those who can afford it and excludes those who can’t.

Projects which relied on government funding to run drama classes etc. for children in disadvantaged areas are now unable to offer free activities to families that cannot afford to pay fees. Many such projects have subsequently closed.

So what is the solution to this funding crisis? The McCarty report recommended ‘examining the existence’ of the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism. This seems a logical solution. After all a department that doesn’t exist can’t have a funding crisis, can it? Abolishing the artist’s exemption to paying taxes was another recommendation. Fair enough, but according to a recent study by the Arts Council, the average income of an artist in Ireland is less than 15,000 a year, so no help there then.

In my opinion, for the Arts, in all its forms, to continue to thrive in Ireland, it is up to us. Fundraising and volunteers are the only way to keep programmes open. For example, the Irish Guide Dog Centre receives only 15% of its funding from government bodies. The rest of the 4 million it takes to run the centre for a year comes from fundraising and volunteers across the country, so it can be done.

As students we are uniquely placed to participate in the Arts, through college clubs and societies. We have a huge amount of choice both on campus and off, where admission is free or reduced, to holders of student cards.

This is the time to get involved, get volunteering. The truth is that in today’s economy the money is just not there, so it is up to us to keep the Arts alive.

Deputy Opinion Editor

A

s the dust settles on Ed Miliband’s appointment as the new leader of the British Labour Party, the enormity of the task facing the bright young leader becomes clear. Ed Miliband’s victory had barely been announced before the Daily Express were branding him the new Pol Pot, while the Guardian were sourcing psychologists from all over the world to psycho-analyse the sibling rivalry which had seen Ed at the last minute snatch the leadership from the grasp of his elder brother David.

This sibling rivalry has fascinated the British Press throughout the leadership campaign, and the damage done to the party as a whole may well be nigh on incalculable. David Miliband was seen as a Prime Minister in waiting.

His highly successful stint as Foreign Secretary, ensured that he can count Hillary Clinton and Nicolas Sarkozy amongst his strong admirers. His decision to step down from front line politics in the wake of his election defeat is not only a blow to the Labour Party, but a true loss of talent where it is needed most. David’s keen wit and insightful intelligence would have been seen as key to any effective Labour opposition.

Ed Miliband claimed in his inaugural speech that his arrival in power signalled, “A new generation with different attitudes, different ideas and different ways of doing politics.”

This coupled with a few audacious remarks about the soap opera that accompanied the Brown-Blair era gives some insight as to why David Miliband could not have served in the

shadow cabinet. Despite the undoubted fondness that exists between the two brothers, a closely run election campaign followed by the close scrutiny that would follow their personal and political relationship would undoubtedly be fractious both for the brothers and for the Labour Party.

Ed Miliband is in the precarious position of being the leader of a party in which the majority of its MP’s and grass root supporters did not elect him.

Due to the complicated Electoral College system of votes through which the party leader is elected, the influence of the Unions, in which Ed garnered the majority of the vote was enough to see him appointed as the new leader. The Tory Media’s predictable tag line of Red Ed might have seen the new leader in a mad dash to reclaim the centre ground; however, he has to his credit, remained unflinching. He has claimed that the British public need to redefine where the centre ground is.

Ed Miliband needs to remain firm and show that he is a man of strong convictions. While the chameleon Tories oscillate between espousing their unblemished social conscience and savaging child benefit payments, a strong unflinching and left leaning opposition is exactly what the public needs.

In the dying days of the New Labour era, one could scarcely define a difference in Labour and Tory policies. It is important now that Ed Miliband once again polarizes British politics and opposes Tory policies that hit those at the bottom of the social ladder hardest.

Despite being in opposition for the first time in 13 years, the

Labour Party has reason to be optimistic. The Conservatives may well have risen to power on a mandate to fix the British economy, but it is unlikely that their poll rating will survive too many more batterings like the one it received in the wake of the recent cuts to child benefit. Also cause for optimism is the fact that for the first time in over 20 years, the left is reawakening. The Labour Party in Ireland was polled in a recent Irish Times survey as the most popular party amongst voters, whilst the morning after his election Labour polled ahead of the Tories for the first time in three years. However, Miliband is observant enough to know that in times of recession, the economy is the only game in town.

George Osborne’s decision to vastly reduce public sector spending, while increasing VAT to 20% is a huge gamble.

The Conservatives may feel that they are in a position now to introduce their strongest cuts, but leaving a recession hit population with even less bang for their buck is risky business.

With senior Labour politicians such as Alastair Darling, Jack Straw and Lord Mandelson stepping aside from front line politics, Labour have achieved a makeover few would have thought possible six months ago. Ed Miliband has a chance to lead a new generation to dismantle and disrupt this ConDem coalition, and if he could only hold his nerve, by 2015 No.10 Downing Street may well be welcoming a new occupant, sooner than many had anticipated.

Labour Party leader Ed Miliband will be aiming at a swift return to government. Photo: flickr.com/net_efekt

Roll of honour to recognise engagement Prof. Patrick J Prendergast Vice Provost/Chief Academic Officer

Prof. Gerry Whyte Dean of Students

T

rinity College has always recognized the importance of ensuring that our students have the best student experience possible. A reputation for a lively and rewarding student life is one of the factors that prospective students take into account when deciding which university to attend; furthermore the student experience is also very important for the holistic development of students giving them the true benefits of higher education and forming bonds with the College that will endure a lifetime.

Accordingly, in our most recent Strategic Plan, we devoted an entire chapter to the

promotion of the student experience. Our objectives for 20092014 include the opening of a student centre; the enhancement of student services; the promotion of civic engagement among students; and the maximizing of opportunities for learning outside the classroom.

In the Strategic Plan we also profiled the important work of clubs and societies; from the ‘grand traditions’ of the Hist to ‘exertions’ of Ultimate Frisbee.

With regard to learning outside the classroom, last June, Board approved a proposal to introduce the Dean of Students’ Roll of Honour recognizing those students who have engaged in extra-curricular activity during

the academic year with College clubs or societies or, indeed, with outside organizations.

Students develop important skills through extra-curricular activity and the primary purpose of the Roll of Honour is to facilitate students in recognizing this fact by reflecting on their experience. We say to students reading ‘Please apply’.

Róisín McGrogan was appointed as the College’s Civic Engagement Officer last year: since then Róisín has taken a number of specific steps to promote civic engagement among staff and students. We hosted a Volunteer Fair in which some 300 students were able to meet with more than twenty community organizations to learn about opportunities for volunteering and now circulate a monthly voluntary opportunities e-bulletin to members of the College community, liaising with approximately 80 local, national and international

community organizations.

Róisín is now an accredited President’s Award Leader for Gaisce and is available to support any Trinity student who wishes to apply for a Gaisce award. As part of the European Voluntary Service, Trinity can now send volunteers on a learning experience of up to twelve months in a host community organisation in another European country (or elsewhere in certain circumstances). More information about College’s initiatives in relation to civic engagement may be obtained here - www.tcd.ie/Community We have also worked to enhance student services in a number of key areas. The tutorial system is one of the most distinctive features of the Trinity Experience, offering an unrivalled level of academic and pastoral support for students and last year, College introduced a similar scheme for

postgraduate students called the Postgraduate Advisory Service. The recent relocation of the Student Counselling Centre to larger premises in 7/8 South Leinster St. (near the National Art Gallery) significantly enhances the capacity of that service. The new premises also houses the studentrun S2S peer mentoring and support programme. Meanwhile, the Chaplains provide a welcoming and supportive environment for students of all creeds and none, hosting regular events and organizing trips overseas to Africa, Palestine or Taize.

Mindful of the impact of the recession on our recent graduates, the Careers Advisory Service (CAS) has a dedicated service to help graduates plan and manage their careers. Together with three other institutions, CAS has also developed a website, www.careers4graduates.org , that functions as a

virtual careers service.

The Trinity student’s experience in College is greatly enhanced by the state-of-the-art Sports Centre. Sport is an integral part of the social and cultural life of the College; sport really makes a difference in the broader educational process and in changing and enhancing the quality of students’ lives. Sport and regular physical activity helps combat physical and mental stress, provides opportunities to learn new skills, experiences and attitudes, helps develop social and team building benefits, and can boost self esteem, which all aid the personal development and future careers of students - and it’s fun! The Sports Department also liaises with other College Service providers such as Counselling (for exercise referrals), Health (referrals and health promotion), Disability (respite provision), Careers (volunteering), and

the Nursery (children’s programmes) in order to develop and enhance the overall Student experience. It is a pleasure to record here the outstanding leadership given by the various Directors of student services in providing services to students in a very difficult funding environment.

Looking to the future, a major priority for College is the development of a new student centre in Luce Hall. In addition to providing additional social facilities for students, including a new gig venue, the proposed centre will also provide improved accommodation for clubs and societies and will also act as a focal point for College’s civic engagement activities, particularly with the local community. It is also proposed to relocate the crèche to the student centre. Of course, student support for this venture is vital to its success and students should expect more discussion

about the proposal in the coming months.

The student experience in Trinity is part of what makes the College distinctive on the global stage. Recalling our own student days, we know how much is learned outside the formal academic setting, and the importance of this learning seems to become greater with the passage of time. Trinity is committed to maintaining a vibrant student life in the College, and to exploring new possibilities as part of our ongoing commitment to the intellectual and personal development of our students.

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www.bankofireland.ie/studentmoney Terms and conditions apply to the free flight offer. To qualify for the free flight voucher applicants must open a 3rd level student account between 1st July and 31st October 2010 and use the account 10 times between those dates. Qualifying applicants must be over 18 years of age and in first year of 3rd level education. The free flight offer is available while stocks last (13,000 free flights available for ROI & NI customers). Bank of Ireland does not accept responsibility for availability or services provided by promoter Scream Limited T/A WIN | WIN. Terms and conditions apply to the 3rd level student account.

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15

The University Times | Tuesday, October 19th 2010

Timessports dan bergin tries...

American Football So, dear readers, it seems that by ‘try out odd sports’ my editor in fact meant ‘try out sports which will probably cripple you.’ First up on the pain platter? American Football. For those of you who don’t know anything about American Football in general, this website will answer many of your questions: www.google.com.

Picture the scene, two vaguely homeless and hung over looking lads show up at front arch for Saturday morning training.

Hung over bum one (that’s me, I was in rag order,) turns to Homeless drunk two (that’s my editor, he just looks that way most of the time) and says: “What am I doing here anyway isn’t American Football pretty well known?”

I get the reply: “Well, to be honest, Dan, I was hoping you’d get hurt.”

So here I am sitting on the bus. Ahead of me, a man who keeps calling me ‘paperboy’ and smiling like he’s imagining the sound my legs might make while breaking. Behind me, the team captain; who is steadily giving me the impression that for the duration of the training, everyone will be speaking another language. Stepping onto the pitch in the Santry training grounds; wearing uncomfortable football boots, tracksuit bottoms and my trusty thundercats tshirt, I was surprised. It did indeed feel like stepping into another world. A world of running and massive shoulder pads.

And not in an 80’s “hey lets remake a Cindy Lauper video” kinda way.

Essentially American

Football is a game of short, intense moments of play preceded by a lot of preparation.

The attacking team plans their movements to progress forward with the aim of taking a ball across the touchline at the far end of the field. Meanwhile, the defending team try to come up with a strategy, which will prevent the attacking team from moving forward.

The important thing is that neither side knows what the other side is doing, so they’re just trying to pick the best play and

done with the air of disgruntled resentment, which I expected (and was feeling.) Instead, ‘yes coach, sorry coach’ and off for a long jog.

I contemplated this as we separated out into lines for a series of stretches, hoping that I would be able to keep my cold breakfast roll down and wondering how long a broken leg takes to heal.

As it turned out, my editor was to be disappointed.

With the air of people knowing where they were going, the group separated out into their various sections to begin training drills. I found myself in receiver drills, a practice which involved spending fifteen minutes catching a ball in my chest while running forwards (breakfast roll complaining at every thump of fake-leather on stomach) Suitably tired and disoriented we moved on to a drill of running around bins. I didn’t think my hips could hurt the way they do now. To be honest, the experience was pretty much what I expected. A lot of running, a lot of ball throwing. But, aside from a few sore muscles and a vague feeling of bitterness towards my well-rested editor, it was an enjoyable endeavor and one, which I would recommend to anyone with an interest in team sports. Good crowd, good fun.

If you happen to know of a sport that will get me hurt, feel free to e-mail my editor and Broadway musical producer Manus ‘You wanna be famous?’ Cronin, at sports@universitytimes.ie.

It’s a world of running and massive shoulder pads. And not in an 80’s “hey lets re-make a Cindy Lauper video” kinda way. hope that when they run up the middle with the ball, the other team have gone left field. Think of it like a kind of team version of rock, paper, scissors. But instead of rock, you have ‘the hail mary play,’ and instead of paper, you have ‘blitzing.’ I can’t think of a clever comparison for scissors, so let’s just say steroids.

So, as the only one not wearing shorts, I survey the area.

Grass, check. Balls, check.

Men, who are considerably fitter than I am, check.

Then, without warning “coach” shows up and finds this set up unsatisfactory.

For some mysterious reason, things are not as they should be. So we will do laps. And we do laps. Strangely, this is not

Dan Bergin takes the physical attention of DUAFC like a champ. Photo: Manus Cronin

Dungan to attempt marathon for charity Manus Cronin Sports Editor After graduating from college, returning from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival following a sell out run of his show “A Betrayal of Penguins - Don’t Run with Scissors” with Players Chair Matthew Smyth, as well as featuring in another sell out with “Medea” in the Dublin Fringe Festival, you would imagine Ross Dungan would deserve a bit of a rest. You’d be wrong.

In a move which his doctors have termed “medically unsound” Ross is in training to run what will be his second Dublin marathon.

The decision was made when the team behind the first “Betrayal of Penguins run Dungan, Smyth, Ben Clifford and Robert Kearns - teamed up and vowed to tackle the marathon together, drawing on their collective strength to push through the pain barrier to sucesss.

In an eminently sensible move, all but Ross found themselves with schedule conflicts that would prevent them from taking part. There was to be no stopping Dungan though as he reasoned that “a change is as good as a break” and pledged to plough on alone.

Last year’s marathon was not only Ross’s first foray into

competitive long distance running, but according to all available records was his first attempt at anything resembling sport.

Nevertheless, he struggled through to finish the race in a respectable 4 hours and 5 min-

is attempting to better his best and complet the marathon in under 3 and a half hours. Ross describes his gruelling training regime in typically modest words “I decided to really up the training this year and have extended my training time

with only an extra seven days training, Ross exudes confidence “I consulted my mum, and she seems to think I can do anything I put my mind to so I’m feeling pretty good”.

Joking aside, preparing for a marathon in such a short

Former Players Chair and standup comedian Ross Dungan is to run the Dublin Marathon to raise money for Alzheimers Ireland. utes, after which he swore off excersise for the forseeable future. This was no mean feet considering that he trained for only three weeks prior to the race. This year however, Ross

from a mere three weeks to a punishing four-week schedule” When asked if he had consulted anyone regarding the feasability of slashing more than 30 minutes from his time

time is tough, He had clocked up 20 miles the day before our interview which took place at the Players theatre, a venue that Ross knows well from his days as chair of that society.

Last year he took on the marathon in his capacity as players chair alongside Ben Clifford, the then chair of comedy soc to raise money for the Trinity Fringe.

This year Ross is attempting to raise money for Alzheimers Ireland, something which he believes to be “a far worthier cause” He succesfully raised over €500 last time out and hopes to more than double that tally this time around.

All Donations are welcome and can be made via the Facebook group “Ross versus the dublin marathon” When asked for any advice to any young aspiring marathon runners, Ross had but these few clear and simple words to say “I’d say that they should pretty much do the opposite of what I did”.

We’ll be hearing from Ross in the next issue to let us know how he got on and we’re keeping fingers, toes and any other conceivable appendages (some of which we haven’t crossed for years) crossed in the hope that he will complete the marathon in no worse health than when he began. In his own words “it;s a big risk” but his trainer, Cameron McAuley believes in him and so should we all. We all wish him the best of luck.

GAA field first ever Ladies’ 2nd team

We need Sports Writers.

Over the years Trinity GAA has had a tough existence, being derided from within the college community and scorned by opposition but things are changing for the better. The introduction last year of portable GAA posts on the cricket pitch was a significant turning point as it not only saved the teams a trek to training, it allowed the wider college community the opportunity to watch Ireland’s national games being played first hand. Ladies Gaelic football remains one of the fastest growing participation sports not only in Ireland but across Europe, Australia and America and of course in Trinity. On Monday October 3rd a little bit of Trinity sporting history was made when for the first time ever Trinity Ladies GAA fielded a 2nd team. The ladies took to the field for this landmark occasion against Marino College of Further Education, a team backboned by established players Including Dublin’s Niamh McEvoy.

In contrast it was the Trinity girls’ first time playing together but they did the college proud with an excellent performance once they got to grips with the game. In midfield Sarah Cotter nullified the threat of McEvoy while up front Kate O’Gorman was full of running, creating space for herself and others, Amy Codd was a constant thorn in Marino’s side and Marie Howard created her own bit of history as the first player to score for Trinity II’s helping herself to a hat trick of points. There were great performances all over the field and especially in the second half superb pressure from the defence forced Marino to take shots from the most unlikely positions.

The existence of the second team is testament to the growing popularity of Ladies football in Trinity. The team has two more games to play in the group stages of the league so this is just the start of a hopefully successful year.

Get in touch at sports@universitytimes.ie The Ladies’ Hockey team faced a disappointing 4-0 defeat last week at home to UCD. Match Report: p16 Photo: Dargan Crowley-Long

utsports

16

The University Times | Tuesday, October 19th 2010

Inside

Dan Bergin Tries...

American Football

O’Donoghue shines as Trinity take their chances TRINITY 1st XV 30 QUEENS 1st XV 10 College Park

Jack Leahy Deputy Sports Editor In a scrappy game of few clear-cut opportunities, Trinity produced a clinical performance reinforced by a tireless effort from their forwards to record a 30-10 victory over Queen’s University Belfast at College Park on Saturday.

Trinity were aided by a superb all-round performance from full-back James O’ Donoghue, who contributed 15 points with the boot and worried the Queens defence all afternoon with his strong and direct running. His efforts were supplemented by a try each from winger Shane Hanratty and centre Conor Colclough, as well as the last-minute awarding of a penalty try.

Queens were better than the score line suggested, troubling the scorers with a penalty from scrumhalf Ian Porter, who also converted out-half Mark Pyper’s late effort under the posts.

In conditions which prohibited expansive, running rugby it was the boys from Belfast who had the better of the early exchanges, with the impressive half-back pairing of Pyper and Porter controlling the tempo with slick passing and an insatiable ability to find gaps in Trinity’s defence.

The efforts of the halfbacks brought about the game’s first real opportunity as Pyper found lock-forward Michael Ferguson with an inside ball which set the second row free in the Trinity 22. Ferguson was stopped just short and, in a manner that reflected his team’s afternoon, the ball was knocked on and the opportunity lost.

Trinity managed to recover from a slow opening ten minutes to take the lead against the run of play, driving a maul forward into the Queens 22 before winning a penalty, one of an incredible 13 awarded by referee Barry O’ Connell for offside. Full-back O’ Donoghue was rewarded for his two hours

of pre-game kicking practice as he easily converted from 25 yards to leave the score 3-0 before adding a long-range effort ten minutes later to increase his side’s lead to six.

Lock Max Waters saw yellow soon after Touch Judge Garrett Holland adjudged him to have struck his opposite number, but the reduction in numbers only served to inspire his teammates as O’ Donoghue added another long-range penalty and outside centre Conor Colclough raced over to score in the corner after a brisk pass from scrumhalf Michael McLoughlin created space for him on the right wing. O’ Donoghue’s touchline conversion left Queen’s staring incredulously at a 16-0 deficit at the end of a half during which they dominated long periods of play.

Captain Scott LaValla came on late in the first half, and his physicality shored up Trinity’s game in the second half as the pack began to take control of the encounter in forwardfriendly conditions. LaValla showed glimpses of the form which earned him a call-up to the US Eagles national team in June, pawing off tacklers and continuously breaking the gain-line to give his side muchneeded momentum.

But, after Porter had reduced the arrears to 13 with a penalty kick early in the second half, it was the backs that provided the next score. O’ Donoghue managed to calmly gather a loose ball on the opposition ten-metre line before sending a long pass to winger Hanratty, who showed a blistering turn of pace to expertly finish in the corner. The full-back then produced his best kick of the afternoon, converting from the touchline to make it 23-3 to the boys in white.

The visitors created numerous half-chances in the second period, but were unable to convert their efforts into points as perpetual indiscipline and handling errors let them down on countless occasions. While Trinity were often guilty of handling and discipline errors, they managed to take their rare chances and this was ultimately the difference between the two sides. The decisions went against them however, as the referee’s whistle

Captain Scott LaValla (left) looks on as Queens struggle to contain Ciaran Wade’s attacking drive. Photo: Dargan Crowley-Long halted Hanratty who had broken through for a try just after the hour, the touch judge harshly flagging for crossing.

Queens playmaker Pyper grabbed the consolation try his individual performance deserved in the dying minutes as he ran in under the posts after an uncharacteristically lax effort from the tiring Trinity defense. Porter converted his effort to make it 23-10 before Trinity’s pack was rewarded for maintaining the pressure until the final minute as referee O’ Connell awarded a penalty try following a series of scrums which collapsed under pressure from the Trinity front

Hurlers win tense contest TRINITY 0-18 St Mary’s 2-8 Falls Road

Gearóid Devitt Contributor The senior Hurling team returned from their first league game in Belfast with a valuable two points after a hardfought win against St.Mary’s on the Falls Road. After a slow start, with numerous wides on both sides, the student teachers broke through the heart of the Trinity defence with keeper, Michael Doyle, powerless to stop Pearse Close’s neat finish.

The visitors responded well however and enjoyed their best period over the next 15 minutes. Conor Donegan, Leo Sexton, Andrew Byrne & Colm Coughlan (all debutants) knocked over points with Coughlan particularly accurate on free-taking duties.

Just when it looked like Trinity were to enjoy a half-time lead, ‘Mary’s rallied with a string of

scores of their own to leave the score level at half time (0-8 to 1-5).

The second half was an extremely tense affair with no let up in the intensity levels from the home side who harried a chased in all sections of the pitch. Corner-forward, Donegan was a constant thorn in their side however and after an early exchange of scores, he was tripped with the goal at his mercy. The resultant 21yard free put Trinity two points clear. ‘Mary’s were in no mood to surrender however and inspired by centre-forward Aodhan Mc Afee, they broke through for another goal from Donal McKinley after 42 minutes.

Almost immediately, Trinity were awarded a penalty after Byrne was brought down when a goal seemed certain. Coughlan’s rasping shot was deflected onto the post by Ciaran Bellew and it seemed it would not be Trinity’s day. The Kinnity marksman composed himself to knock over the resulting ’65 and from this juncture on, the Dublin side never looked back.

Many of the freshers led the

way in the closing stages with half-back Colm Gleeson & Donegan adding further scores.

It was one of the more senior player who knocked over the crucial insurance score. Lucan man, Kevin Fitzgerald, collected the ball on the right-wing and drove over a fantastic longrange effort to secure a decent four-point victory.

Next up for the Stephen McNamara managed side is the visit of another northern opponent, Queens on Wednesday the 20th in Clanna Gael at 5pm.

Trinity: M.Doyle, D.Hoban, S.Dolphin, C.Prendergast, C.Gleeson, I.Kavanagh, M.Harte, K.Fitzgerald (0-2), C.Coughlan (0-8), A.Byrne (0-1), C.Murphy, O.Daly (0-2), C.Donegan (0-2), L.Sextion (0-2), D.Mason SUBS: J.Kennedy for D.Mason (Half-time), N.Goodwin (0-1) for A.Byrne (53 minutes).

eight.

Overall, the Trinity coaching staff will be satisfied with the side’s controlling second-half performance and in particular the effort of the pack in this AIL Division II curtain-raiser as well as the quality of the finishing on display, they will also be aware that this side’s discipline will have to improve if they are to challenge in earnest for promotion this year. Queens will return to Belfast disappointed not to have put more points on the board, but can have few complaints about the overall result.

Trinity: 15 James O’Donoghue, 14 Neil Hanratty, 13 Conor Colclough (Paul Galbraith 70), 12 Conor Mills, 11 Shane Hanratty, 10 Ciaran Wade, 9 Michael McLoughlin (Sam Bell 65), 1 Colm Goode (Paul McFeely 70), Mark Murdoch (Craig Telford 68), 3 James Gethings, 4 Colin McDonnell, 5 Max Waters, 6 Hugh Kelleher, 7 Dominic Gallagher, 8 Alan Mathews (Scott LaValla 40).

AIL LEAUGUE Division 2

P

W

D

L

PD

B

Pts

1

Ballynahinch

2

2

0

0

59

2

10

2

Malone

2

2

0

0

38

2

10

3

Ballymena

2

2

0

0

38

2

10

4

UCD

2

2

0

0

11

1

9

5

Bective Rangers

2

2

0

0

21

0

8

6

Belfast Harlequins

2

1

0

1

21

2

6

7

Dublin University

2

1

0

1

18

1

5

8

Corinthians

2

1

0

1

-2

1

5

9

DLSP

2

1

0

1

-2

1

5

10

Midleton

2

1

0

1

3

0

4

11

Old Crescent

2

1

0

1

-6

0

4

12

Queen’s University

2

0

0

2

-26

1

1

13

Old Wesley

2

0

0

2

-43

1

1

14

Thomond

2

0

0

2

-37

0

0

15

Clonakilty

2

0

0

2

-44

0

0

16

Terenure College

2

0

0

2

-49

0

0

UCD show 1st XI how it’s done TRINITY 0 UCD 4 Santry

Mairead McParland Contributor Trinity’s Ladies hockey team got their season off to an action packed start this weekend with a double assignment, facing last year’s Irish Hockey League winners Railway Union on Saturday before squaring up to rivals UCD on Sunday. Despite a good performance against Railway Union, the defending champions ran out winners on a 2-1 score line but Trinity went to Santry for the UCD derby with confidence after some great individual displays.

The opening exchanges were evenly matched with Trinity’s Meabh Horan and UCD’s Leah Lenehan providing their sides with options on the wing. UCD had he first glimmer of a chance but Rosie Carrigan’s shot was forced

wide after super pressure from the Trinity defence. The home side built up some momentum with Eanna and Meabh Horan driving forward to expose gaps in the UCD cover. Katy Grehan and Meabh Horan played a neat one two bursting through the centre but the move broke down and UCD broke quickly for the counter attack. Jessica McMickan and Rachel Carrigan were constant threats but Eanna Horan and Caroline Murphy were more than a match for anything the UCD attack could throw their way.

After a period of sustained pressure from the away team it was inevitable that the Trinity defence would be breached.

After good piece of play by Caroline Hill, Orlagh O’Shea was on hand to guide the ball to the net. UCD threatened again immediately with Carrigan robbing the ball in the D but keeper Jessie Elliott stood up and cleared the danger convincingly. Trinity struggled to find gaps in the UCD defence but they started to show glimpses of their potential towards the end of the half. On the stroke of half time a move

involving Meabh Horan, Lucy Small, Katie Grehan and Eanna Horan deserved a score but again the shot trickled harmlessly over the line.

UCD started the second half as Trinity had finished the first

Trinity put themselves under pressure with lots of unforced errors – attacking in waves incessantly. Trinity nullified this threat by playing very deep and defensive but it meant the home team never really threatened on a counter attack as they

were all pushed so far back.

Any time Trinity attacked UCD were putting the player in possession under pressure with gritty defending but Trinity put themselves under pressure too with lots of unforced errors, mistimed passes and balls going harmlessly out over the line. Despite the best efforts of Jessie Elliott, UCD doubled their lead with a score from Rachel Carrigan. “Tempo” was the buzzword being repeated among the UCD players and management and as they upped the tempo the game slipped away from Trinity.

Rachel Carrigan had an outstanding match and was a constant thorn in the Trinity defence. She pressed forward to earn a penalty corner and her side made the set piece count with a fluid move finished by Jessica McMickan to put UCD three to the good. Carrigan capped a brilliant individual display with her second goal and there was no way back for Trinity.

Despite two defeats in two days Trinity will have learned a lot about themselves. With sharper decision making ad

more accurate passing they would have been more than a match for UCD. They will be keen to bounce back quickly from this defeat and fulfil the potential they showed in patches of the game.

Trinity: Jessie Elliot, Lucy Small, Caroline Murphy, Katie O’Byrne, Katie Grehan, Meabh Horan, Lianne Costello, Rachel Scott, Eanna Horan, Caoimhe Bourke, Hayley O’Donnell, Clare Conboy Stephenson, Aibhe Coyle, Alice Ward UCD: Stella Davis, Leigh Peton, Brenda Flannery, Rosie Carrigan, Megan Tenant Humphreys, Orlagh O’Shea, Catriona McGing, Chloe Walters, Rachel Burke, Niamh Atcher, Jessica McMickin, Laura Wilson, Caroline Hill, Leah Lenehan, Amy O’Connor