Trinity has cancelled the physical opening of its strategic plan, scheduled to take place tomorrow, and will instead launch the plan on a live stream due to the “ongoing situation” around the spread of the coronavirus.
In an email to attendees today, Provost Patrick Prendergast wrote of College’s “regret” at the cancellation, but added that “we believe that this is the best course of action under the circumstances”.
The launch of the plan will be streamed on Trinity’s website, Prendergast said, with a highlight video of the plan set to be published tomorrow.
“The health and wellbeing of our staff, students and guests is of utmost importance to us”, he wrote.
The strategic plan – which was set to be opened by Prendergast alongside Dr Nora Khaldi, the chief science officer of biotechnology company Nuritas – technically came into effect on January 1st. At the end of January, The University Times revealed its key details, after obtaining a draft copy approved by the College Board in November.
Postgraduate students are one of the centerpieces of a plan that seems designed to tackle many of the internal problems the College faces while reducing its staff-student ratio – at a cost of €29 million, according to documents seen by The University Times – is another key priority. Meanwhile, administrative and staffing issues receive arguably less attention, with fewer specific promises.
The plan also states that College expects its student numbers to increase from just over 18,000 to 21,500 – a more modest increase than proposals mooted in the University of Limerick and University College Dublin in their recent strategic plans – as part of a strategy to “maintain the success story” of Irish universities.
An additional 1,000 non-EU students will be admitted to Trinity by 2025, bringing their total number to 4,000. Non-EU postgraduate students will also increase by 42 per cent. “In a national context”, the plan states, “where policy values internationalisation, we are proud that our sustained efforts to bring students from around the world to Trinity play a substantial role in the €386m that international students contribute as export income to the Irish economy”.
The strategic plan also pledges to “stand up for research” – demanding more funding for investigator-led research and, significantly, beginning a campaign of “systematic lobbying for … increased stipends for funded PhD researchers”.
Last week, The University Times reported that Trinity is to press ahead with plans to apply for a silver Athena SWAN award – necessary if it’s to retain vital research funding – despite the strategic plan flagging 2025 as the date by which it hopes to have achieved the medal.
Clodagh Brook, Trinity’s newly appointed associate vice provost for diversity, equality, and inclusion, told The University Times in an interview that “what we need to do is put in for silver by 2022 – that’s the important thing, and get it later on, that’s as far as the external eye would be concerned, so we need to put in for silver in 2022”.
“I would hope that we put in and achieve it in 2022”, she said. “It’s a steep curve. We’re moving very fast on it now, and there’s a lot of energy behind it, and obviously what I want to do is get silver by 2022.”
But internal minutes presented to Board on December 18th and seen by The University Times, acknowledge that “efforts to date for Athena Swan accreditation in the University yielded disappointing results”.
And a confidential risk assessment of the strategic plan, obtained by The University Times, flags the risk of an “impact on finances due to underachievement of Athena SWAN targets which require Silver status by 2023 to retain SFI, HRB and IRC research funding” – as well as the “risk of reputational damage due to poor publicity”.
