‘Irish education a cost-effective proposition’

For students keen on pursuing their higher education in Ireland, Education in Ireland, managed by Enterprise Ireland — the agency responsible for developing, promoting, and branding Ireland’s international higher education offerings — had organised a fair in four Indian cities: Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai, and one in Delhi to take place on November 23.

The fair, as a first point of contact between students and participating universities, endeavours to address inquiries on important aspects of studying in Ireland such as courses on offer, pedagogy, and university-industry linkage through research and business collaborations, and demystifying the process of applying to the universities, scholarships, visa, stay back options.

In conversation with James Mackrill, Manager, Enterprise Ireland; Business Line On Campus finds out what higher-education in Ireland has in store for students (excerpts).

What makes Ireland an attractive destination for education?

Ireland is an English speaking country with a long standing tradition in education (dating back to the end of the fifth century), of educating monks.

Today, a thriving multi-cultural, safe country, Ireland offers a cost-effective proposition for acquiring a world class education.

One of the key questions students are concerned about is where their degree will take them. Could you elaborate how educational institutions in Ireland have tried to address this?

With over 1,000 multinationals based in Ireland, it has a significant information and communication technology cluster. Large, global companies such as Paypal, Microsoft, Intel, IBM, Facebook, Google and LinkedIn have their European headquarters in Ireland.

About 12 of 15 top pharma companies are based here; it has a booming medical devices manufacturing industry that competes with Singapore. Likewise, the presence of dynamic and growing Irish- owned businesses, all together offer a widerange of opportunities post-graduation.

Similarly, Ireland’s size — as a small country — is a competitive advantage.

There is a good chance that the professor at the University would know someone, for example, in Microsoft or Intel. For a course the University is offering, to make it more tailored to industry requirements, they would have taken the assistance of this direct link with, say, Microsoft whilst preparing the syllabus and curriculum. This is an important feature to appreciate.

Not only would this course be more relevant to the industry, owing to such collaboration, but also that Microsoft would be aware of this, proving the graduate of such a course more attractive to recruit.

Given that the courses offered by Irish universities meet international benchmarks, if not Microsoft’s, the fact that the course includes skills required by Microsoft, making it more industry appropriate, would ensure that the graduate is recruited within the right eco-system providing a strong starting point in their career. This is a key differentiator between an Irish education and others.

What is the scope for acquiring an MBA in Ireland?

There is an array of management education schools in Ireland. For instance, the Smurfit business school, is highly ranked in Europe, and the world.

This school, like others, attracts a lot of students owing to the fact that its curriculum meets international standards, while being closely connected to the industry. Apart from this, Ireland has a strong ethos of entrepreneurship.

Our small population forced an outward orientation to be adopted while doing business, and Ireland has to export most of what it makes.

Business schools have realised this and have a thread of entrepreneurship running through their courses.

Could you enumerate the criterion that qualifies an applicant for a visa, and what benefits it bestows?

At the outset, good applicants and a clean application which can show qualifications, funding and living expenses, go through fairly easily.

At our end the problem is of longer visa approval periods owing to increased number of applications. We are trying to rectify this by adding more resources to ease the application and visa processes.

Once sanctioned, the visa offers an opportunity to temporarily work during the holidays and while pursing the course.

Thereafter, the one-year stay back programme offers a window of opportunity to move into big or small companies from well-recognised programmes.

pradipti.jayaram@thehindu.co.in