Speaking at the
launch today, Minister O’Sullivan said: “I very much look
forward to the ideas, the innovation and new knowledge that the UCC Centre for
Global Development will generate in the years to come. It will be important that we in Irish
Aid, the new UCC Centre and the higher education sector as a whole identify opportunities
for sharing the knowledge and the lessons learned on a regular basis with one another.”
“Partnerships
between the Irish Aid programme and Higher Education Institutes can make a
tangible difference to the lives of people in some of the poorest and most
marginalised communities in the world.
I commend the work of UCC to date to that end and look forward to
renewing our partnerships in the years to come.”
Some 100 UCC staff members are actively engaged in global development
in one way or another, through teaching, research and volunteering. Many strategic
partnerships have been built with universities, international aid agencies,
European and international bodies, including the European Commission, the World
Bank, and philanthropic organisations.
Strong links exist with several higher education institutions in the global
south, including a well-established partnership with the University of Mekelle
in Ethiopia. The joint Masters degree in Rural Development with Mekelle was in
fact the very first NUI degree to be jointly awarded by two independent institutions.
Close ties with Irish Aid, and with leading Irish NGOs such as Concern,
Trócaire, Bóthar, Gorta, Goal and The Hope Foundation have been developed by
individual staff through a range of teaching, research and collaborative
projects with partners in the developing world, and several staff, academic and
non-academic, have participated in volunteering with organisations such as
Friends of Londiani, the Niall Mellon Trust Project in South Africa and the
Haven Project in Haiti
Student societies at UCC such as the International Development Society,
the International Relations Society, One World, and Amnesty International,
actively support student engagement with development issues worldwide and the UCC
Centre for Global Development is working with the student body to establish a
form of accreditation for volunteering activity in the developing world.
“The first major step in the creation of an organisational structure
for the delivery of UCC’s Strategic Plan ambition for engagement in global
development has now been taken with the formal launch of this Centre”, said Deputy
President Professor Irene Lynch-Fannon, Head of the College of Business and
Law.
The Director of the UCC Centre is Professor Patrick Fitzpatrick, Head
of UCC’s College of Science, Engineering and Food Science (SEFS). Professor Fitzpatrick said increasing
numbers of students at second and third level, and adults already in the
workplace, are participating in volunteering. “International aid is coming to be regarded more as a
participatory activity than part of a passive “donor culture” he said.
Pictured at the launch of the UCC Centre for Global Development were: Professor Patrick Fitzpatrick, Head,
College of Science, Engineering and Food Science, UCC and Director of the UCC Centre for Global Development; Deputy President,
Professor Irene Lynch-Fannon, Head of the College of Business and Law, UCC;
Minister Jan O' Sullivan and Dr Paul Conway, Associate Director of the UCC Centre for
Global Development.
For further information please contact: Marie McSweeney, Press Officer,
University College Cork (T) 021 4902371; (086) 0845182.
May 27th 2011
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