REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE FORTIETH ANNIVERSARY DINNER CELEBRATION OF ATHLONE IT
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE FORTIETH ANNIVERSARY DINNER CELEBRATION OF ATHLONE INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
Dia dhaoibh a cháirde; is mór dom an áthas bheith anseo in Áth Luain inniu don ócáid mór cheiliúradh seo i saol na hinstitiúide.
My warmest thanks to Professor Ciarán Ó Catháin for his kind invitation to join your celebration of the fortieth anniversary of Athlone Institute of Technology. Here in this room, we have a wonderful cross-section of people who mirror the history of this place – from those who were associated with the establishment of the college and those who steered its development over the years, to graduates and industry partners who are proud of AIT’s stellar reputation, a reputation built painstakingly and so successfully over these four decades.
Mind you, this region was already well-tilled and fertile ground for educational excellence long before the first sod was turned on the Institute. The great monastic community at Clonmacnoise had kept the flame of knowledge and enlightenment shining brightly throughout Europe’s Dark Ages. In a world without internet or airplanes, blogs or satellites, the fame of the scholars of Clonmacnoise was global. Today they are a part of Ireland’s proud intellectual heritage and here in AIT a new generation of scholars is writing its own unique chapter in Ireland’s story as a place of first-rate higher education teaching and research.
When the first staff and students walked through the doors of AIT forty years ago, they were stepping into much more than a new College. They were the beginning of a new Ireland which was for the first time in its history feeling the surging power and ambition released by universal free second-level education. The then new network of Regional Technical Colleges around Ireland created accessible, local conduits where that ambition could be shaped, utilised and developed so that Ireland’s young people would have the education and training that would maximise their potential and our country’s potential. Over the forty years of AIT’s existence, there has never been a time when the Institute could sit back on some kind of complacency plateau and believe the work was done. Each year has brought its own stresses and strains to be faced down so that the Institute could survive and prosper and with it the midlands region, for this place is an essential leaven at the heart of Ireland, a game-changing resource which underpins local business, investment and entrepreneurialism to a very significant extent.
There have probably been no easy years and certainly these years of economic retrenchment have been and continue to be particularly difficult. But this Institute is a problem-solving place and so confronted by the curve ball of recession it looks to its strengths and others look to it for leadership. Our people want and need jobs. They want to be able to pay their own way, pay their bills and live without the dread of debt or joblessness. Here on this campus your faculties and the Midlands Innovation and Research Centre promote the kind of innovation and support for start-up enterprises on which we will build our hope for the future. Here the words “smart economy” are brought to life with real confidence in our collective ability to change the misery of the moment to a chapter of remarkable success against the odds.
Many of those who knew the original Brown’s field on the outskirts of the town four decades ago would have regarded as outlandish and foolish the idea that there would one day be in that field an exciting campus with 6000 national and international students. Even on the day it opened with one hundred students, its 21st century profile could hardly be predicted but here it is and AIT is stunning proof that an ambitious vision can become a thriving reality.
The impressive buildings tell only part of the story, for of course the culture of the Institute has been key to its success. The flexibility of access and courses was radical and right. It opened higher education up to men and women who had been excluded by more rigid systems. It encouraged a social inclusion which has enriched the lives of individual students, strengthened our civic society and helped us along the road towards that egalitarian republic described in the proclamation where the children of the nation are cherished equally. Part of the Institute’s culture has been its relationship with the local community – its embrace of that community in everything it does and its firm view that this place can set standards and create opportunities that are up there with the best on offer nationally and internationally. Who could ever fully measure the good this Institute has done for science and technology, for its students, for the community and for our country.
One of Athlone’s most famous sons, the novelist John Broderick, offered an insider’s view of this ‘city of the plain’. “There is more in the midland counties of Ireland than meets the eye,” he wrote. After enduring centuries of invasion and destruction, Athlonians had developed a philosophical approach to life, one that reflected “the greatest of all Athlone qualities: survival”. Thanks to the AIT, Athlone has moved far beyond mere survival. It is a by-word for success, for Ireland at its best.
Leadership has been key to that success and I thank those who have been at the helm of the AIT ship over these four decades: Dr David Fenton, James Coyle and Professor Ciarán Ó Catháin. You each grew the Institute with the help of a highly motivated staff and dedicated Governing Bodies and they are all entitled to be very proud of the rich harvest gathered here by their individual and collective efforts. The end of the first forty years also marks the start of the next forty and I wish you all continued success and good fortune in those unscripted years ahead.
Comghairdeas libh go léir. Gurb fada buan sibh 's go raibh míle maith agaibh.