 Hello to all of you joining and I'm delighted to welcome you to the first IIA Young Professionals Network webinar of 2022. My name is Dara Lawler and I'm the new chair of the YPN and I also work as an economics researcher here at the IIA. Given that I'm following in the tradition of YPN chairs called Dara, I want to start by paying tribute to Dara Moriarty, the outgoing chair of the YPN for all of the work that he did, particularly in ensuring the YPN remained vibrant and interesting during the pandemic with all of the great speakers he welcomed and the interesting conversations he provoked. Dara's recently moved on to a new position in Focus Ireland where I know he'll continue to be a part of making a big impact in the important work of Focus Ireland and also in the wider public discourse. For our first YPN of 2022, we're delighted to be joined by Simon Harris TD, minister for further and higher education, research, innovation and science who's been generous enough to take time out of his very busy schedule to speak to us for the error. The topic of today's YPN will be the future of further and higher education in Ireland. In the coming decades, the role of further and higher education, including an increased emphasis on apprenticeships and further education and training will be critical in meeting the modern skills and research needs in the global economy. Minister Harris will speak to us for about 15 minutes or so and then we'll go to Q&A with our audience. You'll be able to join the discussion using the Q&A function on Zoom, which you should see on your screen. Please feel free to send in your questions throughout the session as they occur to you and we'll come to them once the minister has finished his opening remarks. Please remember to list your name and affiliation when submitting your question and you can also join the discussion on Twitter using the handle at IIA. A reminder that tonight's webinar is on the record. So without further ado, I'll now introduce minister Simon Harris and then hand you over to him to get us started. Simon is a native of County Wiclo and was first elected to Dollar and in the 2011 general election as the youngest member of the 31st Dall. He was re-elected in the 2016 and 2020 elections and he served as minister of state in the Department of Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform and the Department of the Taoiseach with special responsibility for OPW, Public Procurement and International Banking, including the IFSC. Simon was Minister for Health from 2016 to 2020 managing the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. In his present role as Minister for Further and Higher Education, Simon has prioritised the delivery of regional technological universities, reform and integration of the third level system, including apprenticeships, advancing social inclusion and equality in education and developing Ireland's human capital through education skills and training, all of which I'm sure we'll talk a little bit more about throughout the year. So minister, we're delighted to have you and over to you. Well, thanks so much, Dara and good evening everyone and thank you very much for inviting me to this virtual event this evening. I'm really pleased to be here with you all to have an opportunity to talk to you about all of the issues Dara has outlined and of course the context in which we're living in Europe at the moment and indeed in the world, so we will get to some of that in a moment, but I want to thank you Dara, I want to thank you Hannah and Lorcan for inviting me and I want to thank you for working with my team to pull this event together this evening. I believe this is the first of your young professionals events in 2022 and I really am pleased to have a chance to be here. I do want to start by thanking everybody and by thanking young professionals, by thanking young people right across this country for all the sacrifices that people have made over the last two years. When I stood in my role as Minister for Health at many, many, many press conferences in government buildings and in the Department of Health back in March 2020, I don't think I could have possibly believed that we still would have been feeling the effects of COVID-19 today in our country, in the European Union and across so many parts of the world and many people have suffered and we lost far too many loved ones and indeed we gathered in the Garden of Remembrance on Sunday to remember and reflect on all those who have lost loved ones, all those who cared for them and all those who sacrificed throughout the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. It's also important to say that we've missed so many milestones in life so I think young people have missed so many milestones. Younger generations have also sacrificed an awful lot over the last two years so my message to Young Ireland is one of thanks, one of gratitude. Thank you for all that you did, thank you for in many ways putting your lives on hold at times and never do we need to wonder again whether this generation is caring, whether it's compassionate or whether we'll prioritize family and community because we have our answer. We've seen it demonstrated in so many ways by Young Ireland and indeed by Ireland over the course of the last two plus years. I think that's the brightest starting point as we try to rebuild our country and as we try to tackle the many, many challenges that face us here at home and indeed abroad. It's that generosity which has brought us to this point and again I do want to sincerely say thank you. We're here this evening to discuss shared European values and particularly shared European values around the common good of education. I obviously can't start any discussion around shared European values and common good without addressing the most horrific situation in Ukraine and our collective action as Europeans to support the people of Ukraine. For the very first time since its formation, the European Commission has enacted the temporary protection directive. For now, Ukrainians arriving in Ireland, this action has ensured much easier access to social support including of course education. I imagine there's been so many countless perhaps directives and regulations have been discussed within the hallowed walls of your own institute and for many experts when they were considering this directive only months ago it was probably considered a dead letter law. It was probably considered a law that would sit on a shelf, a law that may never be needed but it would be good to have it. Sadly, that's no longer the case. There is and was no doubt a need for this when we faced the dramatic numbers of people fleeing from war to the European Union. The swift activation of the directive and the decisive action by EU neighbours acting in concert shows us that the European project is alive and is thriving. In some of the darkest days and probably the darkest days any of us in this call have lived through, we see the European project working and we see Europe acting in concert in support of democratic values of humanitarian assistance and of European ideals. We remained unified as a European Union on the massive challenges of brexit. We came together as a European people to alleviate the pressures of COVID and now as Europeans we have acted in solidarity to defend and uphold our very fundamental foundations. Freedoms and human rights, democracy, the rule of law, multilateralism, all the things that bring us together and unite us in the European project. The EU, the Irish government, my own department are all acting in support of those goals and in practical terms this means the government as well as all our agencies, public servants, parliamentarians, civil society partners, we need to deliver for Ukrainians seeking international protection here and across the EU. For my part I have three jobs. First we need to ensure that people arriving here in Ireland can access English language supports. This is vital not only to get information but also to enable people coming to our country connect with people. It will be crucial for integration and crucial for good social and mental health for Ukrainians while they are here. We're working with our 16 education and training boards across the country to roll out free English language classes in every community in Ireland. The second is to ensure that Ukrainian students who wish to access third level can and I'm pleased to say this is already happening. There has been an open response from Irish universities in terms of facilitating the further studies of those arriving from Ukraine. We cannot allow Putin's goal and vision of destroying the next generation of Ukrainian leadership succeed. We have an absolute responsibility to make sure that the next generation of Ukrainian leaders of thinkers of doers can continue their education in the European Union including of course in Ireland. And thirdly my department is working to ensure that those who wish to work here can do so by recognizing their qualifications here and let's be honest this is tricky. This will require alignment, it will require a lot of work across agencies but we need to do that to make sure that we can try and align qualifications for skilled workers who will be coming to our country. Just last week I was pleased to be able to attend an extraordinary meeting of European education ministers on assisting people leaving Ukraine being truthful. I sought this meeting because I believe we've been at our strongest when we acted together on sanctions, we've been at our strongest when we acted together on humanitarian aid and now we will be at our strongest when we act together on education. I'd written to Commissioner Maria Gabriel the European Education Commissioner not long after the directive was activated to share my very strong view that EU ministers should share information on national efforts and we should develop a common understanding of the educational and training opportunities and supports required by Ukrainians coming to the EU. I also proposed at that extraordinary meeting last week that we established an EU third level scholarship program for Ukrainians to continue their studies and that this should be urgently established. I have suggested and I'm pleased that we're now examining tweaking and altering the Erasmus scheme to allow Ukrainian students register as Erasmus students and access therefore financial supports and universities right across the EU. I think the Erasmus program which indeed was proposed originally by an Irish Commissioner the late Peter Sutherland I think now can really be a mechanism through which we can use an existing European infrastructure modernize and tweak it to meet the humanitarian crisis that is currently developing in Ukraine. I think we also have to as we put that scholarship program in place it does need a specific gender focus and we do need to look at particular supports such as access to child care so that particularly at the moment many women who are coming to Ireland and many women who are coming right across the European Union from Ukraine can continue to access their studies and the issue of child care can be supported also. I think by establishing an EU wide scholarship scheme by altering and amending the Erasmus program to accommodate this we will take concrete steps as a union to ensure that the education knowledge and skills of the Ukrainian people can continue and develop while we're in the European Union. I'm generally an optimist in life and I genuinely hope that in time the people of Ukraine can return to their homeland and with our continued support can reconstruct and build all aspects of their civic society. I'm conscious as I turn to Saad on an expansion of an Irish university yesterday there were university campuses in Ukraine on fire. We must do everything we can to empower Ukrainians to shape a positive collective future for themselves and their country. Education in all its forms is the greatest leveler in society there's just no doubt about that it opens new doors it ensures nobody's left behind and access to second level education transformed our nation. The Dono O'Malley move to make second level education universal and free to all was one of the most transformational decisions ever made in Irish politics it enabled our economy and our society to become resilient ambitious and progressive. I want to achieve that same scale of change at third level the purpose of my new department with the ridiculously long name the department of further and higher education research innovation and science is actually a very simple purpose we are here to nurture the future and to provide a pathway for everyone whether that's through education or employment whether you're reskilling or upskilling whether you're young whether you're old whether you're re-entering education with prior experience in education that wasn't so positive regardless of what your mum or dad did before you what your gender is or what part of this country you live in what I want to achieve for third level education in Ireland working with partners is a web of interconnected dynamic institutions and industry partners responsive to the needs of the learners accessible to all and of the highest quality I'm traveling the country at the moment and I'm talking to fifth and sixth year students in secondary schools about their choice when they leave school and I say to them when you think of the leaving search I want you to think of it as an exam at the end of your second level but I don't want you to think of it as something that defines the rest of your life you have so many options to fulfill life and your career and I go on and I tell them that our third level system will respond as you develop if you want to learn insurance expertise if you want to be an account technician if you want to be a plumber there's a pathway to an apprenticeship I tell them that where I work in the dog every single day people stand up and say we must build more houses and they're right but no member of the doll is going to build one house if every member of doll Aaron came together they wouldn't build a house between them if we're serious about addressing the skills shortages and tackling the housing crisis tackling the climate crisis the climate emergency we need to make sure we have skilled individuals ready to provide the work and the jobs that need to be done in that regard I tell them if you want to test the waters of a discipline before committing further education is there for you in a nearby town or city this idea that at 17 years of age you must decide what you want to do with the rest of your life and have it all wrapped up neatly in a bow isn't real life we put far too much pressure on young people at far too early in age there's nothing wrong in fact it's entirely appropriate to decide after your second level education you effectively want to maybe have a transition year where you want to explore further education and decide what you want to do next before leaping straight in and I tell them if you get the points for higher education in the course you want that's great but if you don't there's often a way around the back of the scroll there are for most professions other ways of getting where you want to get to be that through further education be it through apprenticeships as well I want our younger people to know that I believe they should be in a position where they cannot put a step wrong when they leave school their options will not be guillotined by a bad exam because they don't know what they want to do at 17 or 18 and listening and talking to schoolgoers about their hopes and ambitions and giving them information about their range of choices is an important part of my role and so too is changing culture in this country changing how families and students interact with the third level application process that's why this year 2022 for the first time ever when a student logs on to the cao website they're not just seeing their university options they now see parity of esteem university further education training and apprenticeships this might be a simple step why is a minister talking about change in a website that's no big deal it's because it changes culture I want when the young man or woman sits down with the mum or dad around the kitchen table or on the couch or sits down with the guidance cancer in school or talks to their friend and pulls out the cao website I want that to start a conversation about all of their options not just a snobby or elite or narrow view of what third level education can look like and I'm encouraged to say and see that more and more people are considering apprenticeships they're considering further education we can see this in the traffic from the website 14 276 unique visits from the cao website to further education and training courses 26 439 visits to apprenticeship options by the first of March from the cao website our country needs this we need to expand the range of skills that we have to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow and I'm delighted to say that next month I would bring a policy statement an action plan to government outlining how we create a unified third level system along with the key steps to achieve this I want to just share some specifics of change that I've prioritized since I took office in higher and further education and apprenticeships but before I do this there is another very important aspect of education equality to highlight and we don't talk about this enough and it's particularly for adults who fell out of education in early years for whatever reason in my travels around the country I've learned that there's no right or wrong way to learn and I've learned too that education is not and cannot be for young people only I must admit to feeling some shame as I say this there are hundreds of thousands of people in this country in this knowledge based economy that we talk of that who cannot read there are more who do not have adequate digital skills imagine how keenly felt that loneliness and isolation of lockdown must have been for those people without a digital connection that only the only safe connection we had for many many months on end we cannot progress as an inclusive society if we continue to lock people out of our workforce or civic participation and that's where my department comes in we oversee the work of cellists our national training agency and right now we're rolling out Ireland's first adult literacy numeracy and digital skills strategy to help people gain those essential skills we have to ensure that once they have those skills they can take the next step on their education journey if they want we need to end this narrow view that education is something you do until a certain age in your life and then you're done your education journey continues throughout your life so this strategy the first of its kind in Ireland has that long-term vision it's delivering new structures new supports and learning to people with a specific focus and community accessible learning I just want to share with you some of the key reforms we're delivering in higher and further education as well as our new apprenticeship action plan I'm very excited about the reform of our higher education sector currently underway this week on Thursday I'll bring the HEA reform bill to committee stage in the door this is a once in a generation reform which will deliver a university sector with a modern governance system which is competency-based transparent and accountable the last time a law was introduced in terms of governance in higher education there were 20 000 full-time students in Ireland 50 years ago there's now over 200 000 and the law hasn't been changed in 50 years we need to modernize that governance structure and while promoting academic autonomy the new law will enable codes and policies around specific matters such as diversity equality tackling sexual harassment and having a zero tolerance approach to it students staff and governing authorities will have roles enshrined to ensure universities are inclusive and participatory while promoting the common good of education another big ambition which you referenced Dara that we realized is the strategic program of reform for technological universities we need to move beyond in this country the idea that all roads must lead to Dublin or must lead to the big city just as learning takes place at all stages of life the opportunity to study needs to take place right across our country technological universities have now been established indeed in Dublin but also in Munster the Southeast technological university after years of debate for most of my adult life will now be established on the 1st of May delivering the first ever university presence in the southeast of the country the Atlantic technological university serving the west and the northwest will come into being next month this will bring to five the number of technological universities we have in our country in the relatively short time frame the higher education landscape will have radically altered and consolidated from 14 institutes of technology to five technological universities and I think this is a significant opportunity to enhance progress towards national priorities in the area of access to higher education research informed teaching supporting enterprise and enhancing regional development this is also an exciting time for further education and training in Ireland our FET strategy is driving both economic development and social cohesion this roadmap for the sector is built around three core pillars building skills fostering inclusion and facilitating pathways my department has a vision for FET for a FET future of enhanced penetration of further education right across our population one where a greater share of school leavers are choosing further education or apprenticeship as a first destination one where people will be able to move seamlessly between further education and higher education in large numbers and finally one where a digitally transformed FET system will offer a large choice of flexible online and blended opportunities our education and training system must be able to respond quickly and positively to the many challenges we face I've mentioned the apprenticeship option already we've set a plan of having 10 000 new apprentices registered every year in our country by 2025 we're putting in place for the first time a financial incentive where every employer will get a cash payment when they take on a new apprentice we're setting up a new national apprenticeship office to reduce bureaucracy and drive forward this vision and we're not just allowing the public sector lecture the private sector about the need to do more we're now talking about the public sector having to commit to 750 new apprentices a year by 2025 that means every county council every government department taking on apprentices and putting their hand up to do more it also means broadening the range of apprenticeships identifying where there are skills shortages and working with industry to create new apprenticeships just like the roof plodding apprenticeship we're rolling out the scaffolding apprenticeship the new apprenticeship first ever for haulage drivers in our country which will kick off in Slago shortly as well so I hope I've painted some form of a picture of some of the developments underway in relation to further and higher education I do want to say this also though we need to fund this sector properly and we need to settle the debate about how we're going to fund it we will not fund higher education through student loans and level a load of debt on students as they come out of college we will need greater exchequer funding and I expect in the next month to be able to bring proposal to cabinet that will settle the question as to how we sustainably fund the higher education system in our country and now and into the future of course all of this takes place and is framed against a backdrop of our engagement in Europe and the wider international context there's so many initiatives that were involved in I'm excited about the European Commission's third call under the European University initiative trying to build academic and research partnerships between groups of the European universities already we have Irish universities participating in seven partnerships we've seen a massive increase in horizon funding which will enable further growth in Ireland's research capacity funding for the Erasmus program is being almost doubled over its lifetime which will provide huge opportunities for people in higher education and in further education both students and staff to travel across Europe and I'm particularly anxious that partnerships in further education are increased in relation to Erasmus as well we need to do an awful lot more in relation to that well I do paint a positive picture of our place in Europe I must also talk about our engagement with the UK I've always been adamant that Brexit should not define or restrict the rich history of engagement between our education systems and I want that to continue and grow I want to develop an all island approach to third level education I recently visited a university campus in Derry and in Belfast and I'm really struck by the enthusiasm to collaborate on both sides of the border I've met with counterparts in Scotland, England and Wales and again the appetite to work together is there more than ever Brexit or no Brexit these connections will remain a constant in the Ireland-UK relationship as quite rightly they should so my department's objective is to ensure that Ireland maintains an educational skills system that is agile responsive to shocks and opportunities one that will ensure learning reskilling and upskilling opportunities are accessible and possible to all the battle for the future well-being of any country will be about attracting and retaining talent when we talk about capital capital isn't just physical infrastructure it's about investing in human capital human productivity so every person in this country including Ukrainians who will welcome to our shores have an ability to pursue opportunities and deliver on their full potential for now and into the future education remains the most robust transformative and lasting means to prepare and reorientate in response to changes we've experienced and the changes coming and furthermore and quite crucially a lack of access to education can mean that opportunities for development of talent are being lost to individuals society and the economy we're living in rapidly rapidly changing times in Ireland we have so much to help navigate us through the next decades we should be proud of our education system and its ability to be a cradle of ideas and innovative thinking but we should be in no way complacent nor should we stand still we're well placed to develop graduates who can respond to this rapid rate of change and anticipate future challenges we can equip future generations with the knowledge and skills to navigate the 21st century and despite the dark times we are experiencing now because of that reality because of education we do still have so much to be hopeful about so thank you so much for inviting me this evening and I look forward to your questions thank you very much minister I think you've given a very comprehensive overview of all of the the various policy areas that your department is covering and of course your department is is a new department as well as I've said of only in 2020 so a lot of people might not actually be familiar with the specific work of the new department and how it relates to the Department of Education so I think it's a very helpful overview and just a reminder to people if you have questions for the minister please do submit them using the Q&A function at the bottom I know we have quite a few already so I will get to the questions that have been submitted already but just I suppose to to start on Ukraine I suppose just to ask about some of the practicalities of how the supports for Ukrainian students who are arriving in Ireland will work so would you envisage that the Ukrainian students arriving in Ireland would have the same access and eligibility to SUSE supports as Irish students and would they be able to avail of the EU free fees initiative as well that's available to students who study in the EU yeah the very short and direct answer Dara is yes absolutely any Ukrainian student coming to Ireland or indeed coming to the European Union should be treated as Irish and should be treated as European and we're working now to see how we ensure that the student grant scheme can be made available to all we're also looking this week to try and establish a kind of central contact point for a Ukrainian student coming to Ireland where all our universities can work together so let's say I'm in year three of my engineering degree and I'm from Ukraine arriving Ireland we're going to ensure you can continue your studies but how best do we do that and how do we help you navigate that so trying to have a central contact point and a one-stop shop if you like is something we're working on this week and then on the English language piece there'd be county network set up in general right across our country similar to what we did for COVID so if you end up in in my county of Wicklow there'd be a county Wicklow response team if you like for people coming from Ukraine and we'll be plugging in our further education and training supports and our English language supports to those county networks. Yeah and I suppose it probably links in quite well into a question I have here from Andrew Gilmore who's our Deputy Director of Research here at the Institute who wonders will there be bridging measures in place for Ukrainian third-level students who wish to continue their studies but may have little or no English as their starting point and he wonders will interpreters be provided in universities. Yeah thanks so much Andrew again the short answer is yes the longer answer is I suppose we're going to try and very much do this on a student by student basis so I'm very conscious that people arriving in Ireland will have arrived from a war zone I'm very conscious that the most important thing we do immediately is ensure their safety ensure there's a roof over their head ensure that they're looked after ensure that any health needs physical or mental are met and met quickly and then I want them to have an opportunity to breathe and to re-engage with the education system here in Ireland here in Europe and that's why I want to have this kind of system put in place for the students can link in with let's say a central contact point and they can be individually assessed as to what is best for them in terms of the next steps that they take for some for some it may be quite straightforward they may be at a very early stage of their studies and they can for want of a better phrase slot right in with an Irish education program for another they might be a little bit further on and we actually have to assess the curriculum that they've gone through and how that tallies with Ireland and do they go straight into where they were in Ukraine or do they need to as you say maybe have a bridging period of time and our universities I'm really encouraged are very much open for that on the issue of interpretation again this is something we're actively working with the IUA the Irish University Association and Tia who work with our technological universities on I'd imagine it will be required and like I say anything in that space that is required will be funded and supported by the government. Thanks very much and just in terms of the scholarship that you're envisaging and that you've proposed at the European Council would you envisage that that scholarship would be available to all a Ukrainian students who are entering third level or would you have specific criteria attached to it? Yeah I suppose there'd have to be some degree criteria but at a high level I want this to be a mechanism to support Ukrainian students so I would envisage that I'd like as many Ukrainian students as possible to qualify for it I suppose actually maybe the word scholarship which I use regularly isn't maybe the most appropriate word because it suggests perhaps a limited number I'm more talking about using Erasmus and perhaps an Erasmus award might be a better word to support Ukrainian students financially so that they can draw down what's the equivalent of an Erasmus payment and also so they can be empowered I mean if we're serious about Ukrainian students being treated like Irish students being treated like European students this has to be about empowering them about what's best for their education journey as well and I think Erasmus does empower them because it provides opportunities to study anywhere in the European Union so where is best for me as a student? Is it to study in Ireland or actually you know would my study be better pursued in another European university that's perhaps more closely aligned with what I had been studying previously? Okay thanks very much and perhaps I suppose turning to another topic that you mentioned which is obviously the impact of COVID on the education sector and on society as a whole and I suppose one of the biggest issues that we have in society at the moment is the cost of living and I think this is something that's felt quite acutely particularly by students in terms of being able to afford student accommodation you know their daily expenses as they attend college and I think it is one of the legacies of the COVID pandemic that we have a higher inflation there than we had previously. Do you have specific proposals within your department or ideas to address the rising cost of living particularly amongst those with lower incomes and students? Yeah so I mean there's what we've done right this moment and what I want to do next so we have introduced the first increase in the student grant in many years so the student grant will rise for all students not only will it rise for all students the income thresholds that you can have in your home will increase by a thousand euro so more families will qualify the grant will increase and what we call the the non-adjacent the higher rate of grant will be easier to qualify because we're reducing the distance criteria from 40 kilometers to 35. We put more money into the student assistance fund there's now 18 and a half million euro in the students assistance fund this is a cost of living fund in many ways for a student who can access through their access office and their colleges for a bill that perhaps they can't meet or financial assistance that they require but I'm going to be honest here and I'm not going to beat around the bush I'm not happy with the registration fee in Ireland I think it's too high and there's many people who don't know I'm Ali sure couldn't you just increase the scholarships and grants for second level education that's not what he did he made it universal and it was a transformative decision I'm not stupid or naive I don't believe we can get you know we can scrap a registration fee overnight but I do think it's too high if you have two kids adult kids both attending college at the same time you need to find 24,000 euro just to meet the registration fee if they're both doing an undergraduate four-year degree that's before student accommodation so without getting myself into too much trouble what I can tell you is as I finalised the model for what a sustainable funding system looks like for higher education it cannot just be one that is sustainable for the universities of course that's vital but it has to also be sustainable for students and their families and I suppose what I'm indicating there is that I do want to see the registration fee reduced over time I think it is too high I think it's a legacy hangover of the financial crash and I think we need to do more in that space and that's what I'm actually working on. Okay thanks very much minister in terms of apprenticeships and I think it was one thing that you mentioned there and I think it is really one of the the positive developments that we're having quite a lot of focus now on apprenticeships because it seems in society we have had this attitude towards apprenticeships that it's only really something you do if you if you don't get the points in the leave and search you go and do an apprenticeship which I think is totally wrong in terms of the attitude that we've had to this previously I think as you say we need to normalise the attitudes that we have towards apprenticeships and I think you know particularly in terms of the youth unemployment rate I look at Switzerland where they do a model like this and the youth unemployment rate is a two and a half percent in Switzerland whereas the national unemployment rate is three percent whereas in Ireland at the moment it's about two and a half times the national unemployment rate the youth unemployment rate so I suppose where do you see this vision in terms of your plan in the next five years and then I suppose more broadly in the future where do you see the role of apprenticeships in society going forward say in the longer term or in 10 or 20 years? So I think there's two types of apprenticeships there's let's call them the trades which are vital and I've outlined why we don't have enough people to build our homes to retrofit our homes and we need to continue to promote as good quality careers and qualifications to traditional trades and that's why I think making them more visible on the CAO having that conversation trying to bring about that cultural change financially incentivising employers to take on apprentices setting up a new national apprenticeship office all that's really important. I think the next thing though that's really important is to try and recognise that apprenticeships aren't just about the trades you can also like in this country you can do your bachelor's bachelor of arts and science as an apprentice you can actually do a masters in engineering as an as an apprentice and there's one PhD don't ask me which one because I can't remember but there's now a PhD programme that you can do as an apprentice and my challenge and I don't mean challenge in an adversarial way but my challenge to the university sector and to my own department and to myself is to see how we can develop more degree and masters programmes as apprenticeships because it's just a different way of getting a third level qualification and it's a way that works really well for people because if you meet industry they tell you they end up getting a more a more rounded individual for want of a better word perhaps if you meet learners they tell you well Jesus was great I was able to earn and learn at the same time I was able to get the practical experience alongside the academic so I would challenge particularly our technological universities but also our traditional universities as we invest more and more in universities and I accept we have to do that we also have to look at how we can provide education in a more flexible way and for some people that doesn't mean sitting in a lecture theatre for four years for some people that doesn't mean being able to stop working for a year or two to do a masters that they can't because they have a mortgage and they have a number of kids and they have dependents or whatever else so I think the apprenticeship route and we see this in lots of countries Germany is a good example of Switzerland's another another example where the apprenticeship model you know you can do the degree as as the traditional degree route or you can do the degree as the apprenticeship an apprenticeship model a hybrid model and I think that's that's the destination of travel for many programs. Yeah no absolutely and just a comment here from own Flaherty he says it's really great to see the emphasis on apprenticeships technical education and more equal esteem for types of education similarly re-education funding Ireland spends more than average on health unless an education then one would expect relative to national income an average population age relative to other OECD countries. I have a few questions I suppose on this broader piece around skills and also specifically actually around languages so a question here from own Flaherty again is there going to be a higher education strategy associated with the new plans to target 20 percent of public service recruits will be competent in Irish by 2030 so own Flaherty's statistician in the Central Statistics Office and then a question from Brian Walsh who's a legal counselor and a law lecturer at TUD are there any plans from the department to encourage students in Ireland to take up a foreign language at third level I see that a lot of multinational companies now require a second language on their job descriptions this could put Irish based students at a disadvantage compared to the European counterparts. Yeah really good questions and again the answer to both is yes and so in relation to the higher education strategy the new law that I'm bringing through at the moment that I referenced in my remarks the HEA reform bill commits the minister myself or whoever the minister is to develop a higher education strategy and to publish that strategy and as part of that there will be opportunities to set targets and strategic direction while respecting the autonomy of our education institutions. You will see on Thursday when I publish the amendments to the higher education authority reform bill that I've worked specifically with it with Conrad Noguelia to see how we strengthen the role of the Irish language and the promotion of the Irish language in the third level sector. I believe this is important to do for two reasons one and it's important to do in terms of being our national language and its rightful place in our education system and our culture in our country but it's also important to do because of the huge opportunities that this gives I'm conscious I'm talking to it to a European think tank here in Ireland I mean there are massive opportunities for Irish people to know and for Irish language graduates to get job opportunities within the European institutions and the benefit to Ireland as a country in having Irish citizens based in key roles in the European institutions I think is a whole new area of possibility that our education system needs to respond to. To Brian's point in relation to European languages yes again while I recognise fully that our institutions are autonomous in terms of the courses they provide I'd be encouraging and I'm encouraging in my dialogue with institutions to continue to provide degree courses with with European languages alongside them so a degree in X with a European language. I do think there's a genuine need for a bit of joined up thinking here and you'll probably know this better than I Brian but we do we don't have often the same level of proficiency in European language amongst our young people that many other European countries do and I think how we introduce students at a much earlier age to another European language is really important another European language in addition to Irish and so I'm hoping to do some work with the Department of Education in terms of joined up thinking around a European language strategy and you know I remember learning learning French in in primary school but having to do it as an extracurricular activity you know how do we start actually trying to embed the teaching of European languages within the primary education system and to expose our young people to European languages much earlier because again I think that is a an area of competitive weakness for our country that we do need to address. Yeah and I know there's been a drive as well by I think Minister Byrne to encourage more young people to to take up jobs in the EU which of course may be of interest to people in the call here but also emphasizing that piece around learning a foreign language as part of that which is which is typically very important. I have few questions here around access to higher education and so first question from Tabitha Kenlan who is a UCD post-grad student she asked what definitive steps are you and your department taking to empower people with disabilities to participate in further and higher education and to ensure all these programs are fully accessible and follow UDL guidelines so that's the first question from Tabitha Kenlan and then I have a question from Leanne Dunovan from Airgrid who asks what is your department doing to increase the number of women entering traditionally male-dominated fields such as engineering and I suppose just tying that actually into the the piece around apprenticeships that we were talking about previously I remember when I was reading the apprenticeship action plan one of the figures that struck me in the apprenticeship action plan is that at the end of 2020 and it's quoted in the document only 5% of apprentices were female and only 2.7% had declared a disability and were in receipt of support so I suppose this piece around access applies more broadly to universities to careers but also to apprenticeships as well so how would you go about addressing that in all of those spheres thanks to her and thanks to Tabitha and Leanne and I'm very passionate around the issue of participation and not just in third level within society in our education system of people with disabilities and the work we need to do I can point and list off a load of statistics to show how we've made good progress at higher education and it's true but it kind of misses the point I mean if I'm being really honest I think as a country we've done a pretty good job of ensuring inclusion at primary level good job at second level but for many the cliff edge has now moved from second level to third level and this is what we've got to address one of the first meetings I took when I took up this role was with Down syndrome Ireland and I remember meeting parents who were very upset on the call because they told me not only were they not seeing their child their adult child progress after school like most parents aspire and expect to happen they were actually seeing their child's regress because the education journey for their child came to a very sudden end and the conversations weren't having been had with their child and their family but what would you like to do next and I do think I am a former minister for health I do think that all too often the state reduces narrows the conversation for a person with disability to health supports rather than actually career supports and education supports so what are we going to do about it we're publishing a new national access plan most likely next month for the very first time the national access plan will include people with intellectual disabilities they've never even been included in an access plan before we've included people with visual impairments physical disability never before have we even mentioned intellectual disabilities there is some reasons to be hopeful I can point to places like the trinity center for people with intellectual disabilities an inspiring place I can point to programs for people with disabilities in UCC and indeed you know I'll offend people because I'll leave out others there are many there are good examples the good examples need to become the norm the good news is we have five million euro this year and five million euro each of the next year's out to 2025 to spend on the implementation of this plan so I'd be very happy to have a follow-up conversation with you or any colleagues on this but we expect very ambitious actions expect to focus on people with intellectual disabilities transition planning from second level to third level how further ed and higher ed can interact and how good examples like the trinity center for people with intellectual disabilities can become the norm and expect a five million euro announcement to begin to roll out those measures in 2022 but probably more importantly have an additional five million each of the years out to 2025 Leanne your question's really interesting and again you're probably both by reason of profession and gender much more expert in this than I but my understanding of this without having the statistics in front of me is that Ireland actually we actually train quite a lot female graduates and STEM subjects above the european average so I can again recite a load of statistics to show that we're actually training quite a lot of female and female graduates in stem not enough I accept but quite a lot and more than the european average but when I meet amazing groups like women in technology and science who work with people with engineering backgrounds backgrounds and stem they talk to me about the leaky pipeline and they talk to me about how we don't actually have figures in this country but if you look at Scotland in Scotland something like 75 percent of men with the stem qualification including engineering are working in that field but in women it's less than 50 percent and they talk to me about the range of issues as to how women when they leave third level education even after the qualification often don't end up working in those fields and there's a whole range of societal issues regarding that that they want me to to work with them on so I'm actually due to speak at an event in relation to women and science technology in Crow Park on this topic very shortly but I think it requires a whole of governmental and a whole of societal approach as to how we put the supports in place to enable gender equality in terms of career progression when you graduate from a stem subject and of course I'd be led by people more informed like wits on this than I on the issue in general of engineering subjects I think we again we have to get back to looking at the fact that we have had a reality in this country in maybe all girls schools traditionally the full range of subjects in the stem area weren't necessarily offered in each school that also the case of if I see it I can be it the perception that certain courses were for one gender over the other so I do think again this cultural piece getting role models into the schools broadening the understanding of the options after school showing people female role models in these areas I think will also be important but again any ideas or suggestions I very much welcome your thoughts on it as well Leanne and Dara just on the apprenticeship piece I was invited to meet Ireland's thousands female registered apprentice a woman called Zoe in an account technician in Cork I was delighted to meet her but I was shocked to read that in 2015 we had something like 25 registered female apprentices in Ireland I thought it was a typo I thought it was at least 250 it wasn't it was 25 we've come a long way but nowhere near enough and under our apprenticeship action plan now we talk about specific female bursaries and to encourage more women to take up our apprenticeship programs again and this is in the space of anecdote which is always dangerous for a politician to live in but when I do talk to female apprentices they often tell me that again they didn't hear about it in school they often tell me that maybe the brother knew about it in school but it wasn't presented to them as an option so one of the reasons we changed the ceo form one of the reasons for visiting the schools is to really put apprentices up in life for both genders and to help change maybe cultural views and stereotypes around apprenticeships brilliant thank you very much and I suppose another thing that you touched on in your remarks as well was the development of the southeast technological university which is due to open soon I suppose I'd be interested more broadly in the work that your department is doing in terms of building these new technological universities around Ireland and I suppose replacing the previous model of institutes of technology with this technological university model what benefits do you think this this new focus will bring in terms of having technological universities over institutes of technology yeah if I was to sum it up in one word I'd say scale and so I often get as you often can on Twitter kind of caustic comments of Osher he's open in a technological university at every crossroads and should there be one in every town and village and it kind of really misses the point because of course what we're actually doing here is we're consolidating what we're actually doing here is going from a situation where we've had a number of institutes of technologies and we're actually having a smaller number of technological universities and the reason we're doing that is because we believe 14 institutes of technologies in a country the size of Ireland doesn't get an opportunity to achieve scale in terms of courses in terms of the full spectrum on the qualifications framework from an apprenticeship to a PhD in terms of research so we believe you know institutes of technology have served this country well we're building on their foundations but the phrase university and technological universities these are known internationally so when you're presenting Ireland as an investment as an investment location I think technological universities is a much you're not spending 10 minutes explaining what it is in a boardroom I think that's quite important I think it drives and provides an opportunity to bring into the region's access to the full spectrum on the qualifications framework and I also think it makes us think regionally in Ireland like this is we are a small country we punch well above our weight but we still are a small country and we all like to wear our town jerseys and our county jerseys but actually it's our regions we need to be selling so if you look at the southeast as a region it's not about county Carlo versus county Kilkenny versus county Waterford it's actually about how can we make sure in our region we can become the best place in Ireland and one of the best places in Europe to study X or to produce Y and I think that's the point it always amazes me even in a country as small as Ireland the needs in the regions are often different and when I meet with the regional skills fora we have nine of them across the country they all highlight different issues in terms of skills shortages in terms of what they need in terms of a pipeline of graduates and this provides an opportunity to have a university in the region catering for the needs of that region so I believe this can be transformational I believe it'll be educationally transformational but I actually believe the impact will be much bigger I believe it's an opportunity for the regions to grow and to promote balanced regional development and for that not just to be kind of a slogan or something people say in politics but actually to put our money where our mouth is to expand the footprint of universities to ensure more research happens in the regions and to increase student numbers in the region so not everyone has to pack their bags and head to Dublin but there's actually an opportunity Castle Bar to pick it randomly is now going to be a university town from next month think of the opportunities that that poses to Castle Bar to the people of Castle Bar to the business community in Castle Bar and of course how the regions harness that opportunity I think will be very important and you mentioned there about you know certain regions being able to prioritize certain skills and skills appropriate to each region what would you see say in the next five ten years as being the big areas the new sectors that you think Ireland could make an impact in in terms of skills development and in terms of employment in these sectors and enterprise in the next 10 or 20 years I think it's a great economy in short I mean we we talk a lot about the challenges of climate action and their immense their major and it's not like we have a choice in relation to doing this we're we're facing a a climate emergency and we must respond but we tend to talk about climate in terms of the challenges it's going to present of which there'll be many but the opportunities are also there and if you take one example and I talked to young apprentices about this around the country electric electric vehicles are going to be huge you know over the next number of years so many more of us will be driving electric vehicles who's going to repair the electric vehicles who's going to work on the technology for the electric vehicles where are the mechanics that will know how to to operate and and maintain electric vehicles huge opportunities there the green skills tomorrow I'll visit a retrofitting centre in Wexford we want to produce we want to retrofit half a million homes it's a key plank of our climate agenda in this country make our homes warmer we know the cost of energy of them will make them cheaper to heat in the in the medium term be better for our planet all of these good things we need 17,000 more people by the middle of this decade which is only three years away working in retrofitting so opening NZEP training centres five of them across the country by the end of the year so that's one I think the second area is the the second the second area I think is very much the whole area of digital transformation and at a very basic level getting back to the point I made in in my opening comments about the fact that we live in a country with almost one in two of us lack basic digital skills so how we upscale and prepare for digital transformation but also I think the countries and I talk to people more learned than me in relation to this I think countries that best prepare to deal with the challenge of climate and the challenge of digital transformation are the countries which have the best opportunity and chance to maintain their standard of living at a sustainable level into the future okay thank you very much and I suppose we're we're sort of coming to the end now of the webinar so we're coming up on eight o'clock and I suppose in general these ypns are also a good opportunity to get to know the thought leaders decision makers and the people in power themselves and their backgrounds and their careers and what brought them to this point and I suppose for a lot of the young people on this on this call as well and I think your journey in politics is is particularly instructive I mean you started out in politics I think when you're around 20 years of age and you became a minister in your 20s you know leading one of the most you know difficult departments arguably in the government in the Department of Health and so I would be interested just in terms of your own sort of career advice that you would have for young people particularly starting out early in their careers because as I say you were somebody who made an impact very early on you took the bull by the horns in terms of your career in politics and managed to ascend up the ladder pretty quickly so I think your advice in this regard would be particularly instructive for for some of the people starting out in the careers on this call so yeah look I unfortunately it's one of those careers where there isn't a manual or you can't say to somebody if you do this that or the other study this or do that here's what'll happen and it's certainly not linear but what I would say to people is when I go into schools across the country primary schools secondary schools I always ask a question of students I always say is anybody here interested in politics and being honest most people sit on their hands every now and again if you put up their hands I think it's to make me feel better or to welcome me but then I say to students well hang on a second are you interested in whether you'd be able to buy your own home hands go up are you interested in whether you'd be able to go to college hands go up are you interested in how what's happening in Ukraine and how we protect democratic values hands go up climate hands go up public transport hands go up like that is politics and my message to anybody on this call regardless of your political persuasion and for the purpose of this discussion I don't care of your political persuasion my message to you is if you feel passionate about an issue like I did when my brother was born with the condition on the autistic spectrum I was furious annoyed and other bad words at the lack of support and information available to my family in a wealthy European country and I met then into Kenny and he said you can continue to give out and grumble about politicians or you can get involved yourself and I took the plunge never ever ever do any young person on this call again regardless of persuasion believe politics is about waiting your turn never believe it's about sitting this one out because you're too young or you're too inexperienced we live in a democracy it's meant to be representative it's meant to look like our society young people make up an awful lot of that if you feel passionate about an issue if you want to make your community better if there's something that makes you angry or annoyed and you want to try and fix get involved don't take no for an answer get out there and explain to you and I've always found this about the Irish people and I've made many many mistakes in politics we all do right if you get out of bed in the morning and you try to do something you're never going to get everything right but always always know that the people of this country I think are fair and I think if they believe that you're genuinely doing your best and trying hard they'll come with you on an awful lot of issues so my message to anybody on this call who believes in societal change politics is not the only way to bring it about but it is one way and I think there's a lot of people out there in our country who again regardless of party jerseys want to see the next generation step forward and say I want to make a difference and what I can say is politics is hard it's tough so many careers but it's really rewarding when not the things that make the news but when you can actually bring about a small change that you know has made a difference in somebody's life that's what makes me tick I'm sure it's what makes lots of people on this call tick and I'm sure there's many people on this call and many people have come to your meetings over the course of the year who would make a really good contribution to public life and my message is go for it. Okay brilliant thank you very much and I think it I think it extends quite well to the work of the institute as well we always say our our motto in the institute is sharing ideas and shaping policies so I suppose it just goes to show there are many ways that people can make an influence in their in their careers and and to wider society as well. I've been asked just at the end to give a plug and I'll be short if I don't give a plug for the Brennan Halligan essay competition so the 2022 Brennan Halligan Emerging Scholar essay competition is open for submissions and we definitely encourage everybody to apply so it's an essay competition to honor our late founder in the institute Brennan Halligan who tragically died in 2020 but it's honored the legacy that he left in the institute and the influence that he that he left in our work so there there's a 1000 euro cash prize and there's the opportunity to have your essay published on the IAA website and to present your essay at an IAA webinar and it's open until the first of April but regrettably we have come to the end I'm sure with all of the issues that we could have explored we could have gone on for another two three hours with all of the various things that are relevant to future further and higher education in Ireland but I suppose all the remains is for me to say thank you very much to the minister for a generosity giving of your time this evening and for for taking the questions. Thank you as well to all of you for your very thoughtful questions which have I think made for a really interesting discussion and we'll be back for another YPN very very soon there'll be five more YPNs over the course of 2022 so if this is your first one please do tune in for another one very soon so thank you very much minister thank you very much everyone and have a very good evening. Thank you Derek, good night.