WHILE BRIAN Cowen was in New York this week discussing climate change and most of our Ministers were drumming up support for the Lisbon Treaty, the US ambassador to Ireland Dan Rooney was giving an interesting speech in Pittsburgh ahead of the G20 summit there.

Speaking to the Atlantic Council on Wednesday, Rooney offered some suggestions on how Ireland might turn around the economy.

“We should graduate more engineers and scientists,” he said. “It is important for competition, but I believe we must upgrade the entire curriculum to support a student’s ability to think.

“There is much down time; instead we could enhance the focus for ethics, literature, history, language – along with math, physics, and chemistry.”

Rooney’s wife Patricia was a university professor while four of his children were, or are, teachers. So he should know a thing or two about this.

His comments come at a time when dozens of Irish secondary schools are cutting science and higher level maths subjects due to cuts in teacher numbers.

“It bothers me . . . [that] whenever there are economic problems the first thing the politicians consider is cutting the education budget – that is a small-minded approach.”

Rooney, who came here in July, also thinks Ireland can become a “world leader” in renewable energy. “Ireland has some of the best wind, biomass and ocean energy in the world and, given the Government’s commitment to invest in research and development, it could soon become an ideal site for innovation in this sector,” he told delegates.

“Targeting renewable energy would kill three birds with one stone. It would assist Ireland in reducing its carbon emissions, improve its energy security and – importantly – build a new domestic industry.”