The year is 1975 and there is virtually a Mexican standoff at the National Institute of Higher Education in Limerick. The young institution, which is one year away from graduating its first degree students, has found itself the focal point of the first major clash of higher educational ideologies in the history of the State.
Outside Plassey House, the former rehabilitation institute which now forms the administrative centre of the college, hundreds of students have gathered to protest at a move by the Coalition Government which they believe threatens the college's independence. The Government is insisting that the National University of Ireland, and UCC in particular, should act as the college's accrediting body for courses: it has made the NIHE a designated college of the NUI with the same status as Maynooth, although neither the NIHE nor the NUI had sought such an arrangement. The college authorities and the students believe the National Council for Educational Awards (NCEA) is the appropriate body.
The college's governing body finds itself barricaded in Plassey House as it meets to consider the situation. One member collapses under the strain. In another room in Plassey, Dr Edward Walsh, the 35-year-old college president, is facing an irate Government emissary who wants the college to knuckle down and accept the Government's edict, or face direct rule from Marlboro Street, the possible suspension of the governing body, or even temporary closure. Some 15 years later, Walsh will admit that the college came close to collapse in that year.
This year the University of Limerick celebrates 25 years in existence, from its beginnings as the National Institute of Higher Education in 1972 with 11 faculty staff, 11 general staff and 113 students, to its current position as a university of international reputation with 9,400 students and 735 staff.
In 1972, it had only Plassey House and 70 acres of land. All of the college's facilities were contained beneath Plassey's leaking roof: when the weather was good students would dodge lectures by slipping out the window at the back of the long main lecture room, until one student fell and broke her ankle and the lecturers finally figured out the reasons behind the depletion of their classes. Now the total campus area is 250 acres, with 78,000 square metres of buildings representing a total investment of almost £100 million.
The NIHE Limerick was established in 1972 after a long campaign by the people of Limerick for a university, combined with a recognition in Government of the need for an educational initiative in Limerick, one that would operate outside the NUI.
The citizens of Limerick were, says Walsh, "greatly frustrated" when they were told that they were getting "something better than the traditional university." Walsh, a native of Cork who had studied and worked in the United States, was only 29 when he was offered the job of creating Limerick's new college. Advice was taken from the University of Eindhoven in the Netherlands: start small, operate in pilot mode, then begin to grow.
`We were very fortunate in terms of the faculty and staff in the first place," remembers Walsh. "They were risk-takers and adventurous." Most were young and nearly all had some form of international experience: they came from Oxford, MIT, Wales, Britain, Europe, Ireland.
"The students then were risk-takers also," says Walsh. "They were a remarkable group, all exceptional in the fact that they would take that risk. That environment was very stimulating. We all knew we were taking risks with our careers."
They were blessed with one other great advantage: nobody in Government appeared to have a clear vision of what form the new college should take so bureaucratic interference was kept to a minimum. "We got away with things," admits Professor Roy Hayhurst, now head of UL's MBA programme and one of the original staff members. "In the first couple of months, we were able to get away with some things that people couldn't reverse."
Those irreversible elements included initiatives which are now part and parcel of third-level education but at the time were regarded as suspicious and unreliable: modular courses, credit transfer schemes to enable students to study abroad and, crucially, co-operative education, work experience as a part of all third-level courses. All were tied into the larger vision of the college as an institution with not only an educational mission, but a social and economic mission as well with value placed on independence, entrepreneurship and self-sufficiency.
World Bank recognition, accompanied by low-interest loans, came shortly after, the first time such recognition had been granted to an Irish college. "I'm sure that what they saw was an institution which would make a return for the overall economy and all the downstream societal benefits that would come from that," says Hayhurst.
Walsh describes the World Bank's funding as "lavish." The college, and Walsh in particular, also concentrated on attracting Amerian investment, initially from entrepreneurs with Irish connections. Hayhurst describes it as "tremendously hard and difficult work" but says it was a "surprise" that the doors opened so easily. "It was almost as if they were waiting to be asked," he recalls.
Those who believe in the Fates might well feel that the NIHE was heading towards a confrontation of some kind with other Irish educational institutions competing for funding. "We were not very diplomatic," recalls Walsh. "We alienated some very able and influential people."
Walsh makes it clear that he dislikes raking over old coals. The university now has excellent relations with his NUI peers, he says. Nevertheless, he admits that the mid-70s were a "traumatic time" for the university. In the past, he has used stronger words: he once referred to a process of "slow strangulation" by academic, political and religious forces and to the actions of a number of "well intentioned but inept" Government ministers who forced students, the NIHE itself and the NUI to accept a fait accompli with which none of them was content.
"The extent of the tension between the new and the traditional became apparent only when our first students were about to graduate," says Walsh. "The NUI were faced with the dilemma of being asked to accredit systems that were new and we, as a very weak body without any legislative power and very limited resources, were subject to this process." He describes the situation as similar to Pepsi launching a new product and Coca-Cola being asked to express a view on its worth.
Reason prevailed and the NIHE authorities and the NUI went along, somewhat unwillingly, with the arrangement, until the arrival of a new Fianna Fail Government brought an end to the situation and gave the NCEA responsibility for accrediting the NIHE's courses.
In fact, UL owes much to Fianna Fail. As Minister for Education, Brian Lenihan was sympathetic to Limerick's need for a college and, some two decades later, it was his sister, Minister for Education Mary O'Rourke, who granted university status to the NIHE Limerick and its sister college in Dublin.
Originally, the NIHEs had campaigned to be grouped together under the umbrella of a new national technological university, believing that the Government would agree to nothing more. But an international group of experts appointed to examine the NIHEs' case for university status judged that such a technological university title would not adequately reflect the range of activities encompassed by the NIHEs.
Thus, on January 12th, 1989, the creation of the University of Limerick and a third university in Dublin - which eventually took the name Dublin City University - was announced. The following morning, the NIHE Limerick's receptionists were already answering the phones with the long-awaited words: "Hello, University of Limerick."
The upgrading did not meet with universal approval and its consequences were still being felt earlier this year, in the row over the upgrading of Waterford to Institute of Technology status. Prior to the upgrading of the NIHEs, the RTCs which awarded degrees benefitted from the reflected glory of having the same NCEA-validated degrees as the NIHEs. After the upgrading, the RTCs found themselves isolated from both the established universities and the new arrivals.
Now, as UL enters its 25th year, the university is taking stock. Undergraduate numbers are likely to remain at current levels and the building programme, which includes an almost-completed library and a new aeronautics building, will slow down.
Postgraduate numbers will be increased from current level of 10 per cent of the total student numbers to 15 per cent. There are plans to strengthen international links, to re-orient the college towards adult and continuing education, and to build on areas of particular strength - information sciences, advanced materials and entrepreneurship.
"It's time to reflect on what we have, to review systems, to look at structures again," says Hayhurst. "There are challenges out there and we have to change to meet them."
