Dr Ian Hughes and Bob Grumiau of the DSIS team will be panelists on Climate Justice and Sustainability on Tuesday, Nov 25th (chaired by Dr Ger Mullally):

Programme for Tuesday, Nov 25th (see link below for full programme Nov 24-28): 

9:40am – 10:50am: First Panel: Social Transformations and Inclusions.  

10:50am -11.10am: Coffee Break

11:10am -12:20pm: Second Panel: Climate Justice and Sustainability: Dr Martin Galvin, Dr Liz Folan O’Connor, Dr Niall Dunphy, Dr Ian Hughes, Bob Grumiau - Chair: Dr Ger Mullally

12:20pm - 1:00pm: Lunch

1:00pm – 2:00pm: Keynote address: Professor Kathleen Lynch, UCD. Beyond Human Capitalist Education and Research: Epistemic and Affective Considerations

2:00pm - 3:10pm: Third Panel: Researching with marginalised and/or difficult pasts.  

3:10pm – 3:30pm: Coffee Break

3:30pm – 4.40pm: Fourth Panel: Gender and feminisms: crafting and care. 

4:40pm – 5:00pm: Closing Remarks

On Wednesday, 15 October 2025, Maynooth University Social Sciences Institute (MUSSI)’s Research for Policy seminar series hosted Prof. Brian Ó Gallachóir (UCC/MaREI) and Ian Hughes (Department of Education & Youth; on secondment to UCC, supported by the EPA) for a hybrid session on how research and policy can work together, moving from one-off inputs to long-term, futures-oriented collaboration.
The speakers traced a 17-year journey from providing climate and energy modelling to underpinning policy via service-level agreements, co-producing policy (e.g. the 2015 Energy White Paper; carbon budgets), and building absorptive capacity in departments (training, tool handovers, and reverse secondments). They argued that climate action sits within a wider polycrisis, and that Ireland needs stronger, futures-oriented investment in education, social sciences and humanities alongside STEM, plus funding that enables community participation.