Sir, Some responses to the request from NUI Convocation for graduate opinions on current proposals for university legislation (March 20th) are summarised below.
1.Election of Chancellor. The Council of NUI Convocation has shown a slight preference for the current procedure where Convocation members (Approx. 170,000 NUI graduates) elect the Chancellor. The alternative would be for Convocation to submit a short list of candidates to the NUI Senate.
2.Visitorial Board. The Council has recommended a standing Visitorial Board (functioning as a State appointed academic ombudsman) for the NUI, as in Dublin University and The Queen's University of Belfast. Resolution of conflicts between executive, legislative and judicial functions and academic freedom requires swift, authoritative, and mainly legal, intervention, as was eloquently stated at a Convocation meeting addressed by the Minister for Education on January 18th last. The reply to a Dail Question (June 26th 1994) from Mr Alan Dukes, TD, had confirmed that the Government is obliged to appoint a visitorial board only in the case of an appeal against dismissal of a statutory appointee, and that no requests for a visitorial board have been granted since 1968. Convocation is the only formal university authority known by me to have urged the necessary legislative change.
3.Academic appointment and promotion criteria. One of the NUI colleges now operates a points system for promotion posts, with (depending on the faculty) 20-45 per cent allocated for research and scholarly standing, and 25-35 per cent for teaching ability and performance. This could result in stating minimally desirable research time allocations in future contracts. To quote the Irish Federation of University Teachers' president out of the context of the report by your Education Correspondent Paul Cullen (May 27th), "The most promising researchers and teachers are likely to gravitate (from the universities) towards careers which offer stable employment and worthwhile career structures." "Worthwhileness" requires adequate time for, and supervision of research in the academic's more creative years, if only to keep pace with the surge in postgraduate student numbers.
4.Teaching overload. "Planning to Learn" (Association of University Administrators, Manchester University, 1995), in its Conclusions (pg. 24), states ". . . the intense pressure on academic staff created by the simultaneous expansion in student numbers, soaring student staff ratios and demands to increase research ratings (necessitates) . . . research for ways of reducing the burden of teaching and assessment." It also seemed to imply that lectures, seminars and laboratory exercises should yield to Open University style computerised and audiovisual techniques. If governments cannot afford more buildings and improved student staff ratios the points distribution in 31 above assumes major importance.
5.Quality assurance. At a recent meeting of Irish and British university convocations in Exeter, I said that some agreed research time norm must be basic to any proposed external quality control (QC) assessments. If inadequate research time and facilities accentuated the brain drain from campuses, bureaucratic QC procedures could mask the basic decline in quality. Yours, etc., Chairman of Convocation, The National University of Ireland, Merrion Square, Dublin 2.