Civic Engagement Forum Minutes

Dublin City University
Civic Engagement Forum

Minutes

Meeting of the DCU Civic Engagement Forum at 12.30pm
Tuesday 23rd April 2024, A204, Glasnevin Campus + Zoom

Attendance:
Emer Ní Bhrádaigh, Natalja Matease, Luke Quinlan, Adam Daly, Emma Monahan, Aisling McKenna, Leah Ridgway, Laurence van der Haegen, Emma O'Brien, Michael Mullooly, Siobhán Seoighe, Kathryn O'Mahony, Sylwia Kazmierczak-Murray, Deiric Ó Broin, Carine Mambou, Una Mccabe, Peter Admirand, Una Redmond, Louise Hopper, Grainne Reddy, Padraig Murphy, Samantha Fahy, Hannah Goss, Eabhnat Ní Fhloinn, Majella McSharry.

Apologies:
Liam MacGabhann, Ryan Carey, Roisin Blunnie, Maria Chernyakova, Catriona Murphy.

1. Welcome
Deiric Ó Broin (Chairperson) welcomed all Civic Engagement Forum members.

2. Minutes
The previous minutes were proposed by Sylwia Kazmierczak-Murray and seconded by
Adam Daly. Minutes are available online at: https://www.dcu.ie/civic-engagement/civic-engagement-forum-minutes

3. Matters arising
There were no matters arising.

4. President's Awards for Engagement

Civic Engagement Forum members concurred that the awards ceremony is not solely for the winners but also a celebration of all nominations, an opportunity to share information, and a valuable networking event.

During the discussion, the Civic Engagement Forum members provided the following feedback and suggestions:

• Circulate nominees’ names and project details to Heads and Deans of departments and faculties. This will inform them of the nominees from their areas and allow them to share this information with colleagues, promoting awareness and interest in engagement activities. Knowing a colleague has been nominated can also boost participation in the
  awards ceremony.
• Promote a culture where colleagues nominate one another and recognize each other’s
  engagement efforts.
• Send targeted messages and promote Engagement Awards through the Committee
  Society.
• To better clarify our understanding of student engagement.
• It is important to clearly communicate to students that this is the only award available to
  them.
• Make sure students know that this is the only award they can get through the nomination
  process.
• Update the guidelines for nominators and adjudicators to clarify our definition of staff
  engagement, including examples of initiatives and projects.
• To create a short Promo Video for social media (Tik Tok, Instagram , as they catch
  student’s attention better than all students’ emails).

5. Reports and Updates

Liam Macgabhann, SNPCH Recovery College

The Dublin North, North East Recovery College are delighted to be awarded two new Implementation Science grants.

• The first for €35,000 funded by HSE CHO8 in conjunction with the NE Drugs
  Task force, in association with CORE Ireland. Developing a Trauma Informed
  Community Response to Dual Diagnosis in Drogheda & North East region;
• The second is funded by the Irish Prison Service €463,483 with €393,555 going to DCU and the remainder €69,928 going to our partner Recovery Academy Ireland.
  Developing a Framework for Recovery Education Across the Irish Prison Service;

Louise Hopper, School of Psychology

Psychology Lifelong learning programme has just completed for this semester. We ran two programmes (both semesters) in the last academic year and the response from the local community has been great. We have a Wellbeing Summer School coming up on the 13th-14th of June.

Grainne Reddy, Age-Friendly University

• 12th March - International Women’s Day - Venue The Hive - Guest Speaker was Margaret Hoctor
• The AFU Office had a stand at the 50+ Show March 14-16. It was a verysuccessful event.
• 25th March we had a Multiplier Event for the end of the COPE Project.
• Games Night - 28th March - The Hive (6-8pm)
• Tour of Belvedere House on April 11th by Dr. Tom Mc Cloughlin for AFU participants
• 15th April we have a presentation on Health Age-friendly homes talk with Eimear McCormack from Meath County Council
• 17th April we had a presentation from Spry Finance on Lifetime Loans
• Our next Games Night is on the 7th May in the Hive from 6-8pm all welcome.
• We have our TY Awards Ceremony on the 16th May for Intergenerational Solidarity and Cooperation between Generations 2024
• We have an Exhibition on the 23rd May in the Hive to showcase all the work the AFU participants have done.

Deiric O’Broin, Office of Civic Engagement

DCU's involvement in the region has this quarter has related to small number of distinct areas of work, including:

• The Local Economic and Community Plan for Dublin;
• A skills audit for the Dublin-Belfast Economic Corridor Network;
• EcoCore ULG project in Balbriggan;
• The This City Works Initiative

The first is a statutory process and will conclude in May 2024. It is only the second time that Dublin City Council has prepared a Local Economic and Community Plan and it is a very considerable undertaking. You can view some of the recent public consultation efforts at https://consultation.dublincity.ie/culture-recreation-and-amenity/local….
The skills audit for the Dublin-Belfast Economic Corridor Network recently completed and will be available via the DBEC in the coming months, see https://www.dbec.info/ for more details.

DCU's Office of Civic Engagement is a member of the EcoCore Balbriggan initiative. EcoCore is a green transition in small cities along transport corridors initiative funded by the EU, see https://urbact.eu/networks/ecocore for details.

This City Works is a job-seeking and skills development partnership between Google, a number of public agencies and local community initiatives, see https://thiscityworks.com/ for further details.

Laurence Vanderhaegen, Access Service

1. Change Makers Mentoring programme
   Our annual Change Makers ceremony celebrated all students who took part in our peer mentoring programme which brought together students from Youthreach Ballymun, Trinity Comprehensive and DCU. We are currently creating a resource so that this programme can be replicated with other under-represented groups in disadvantaged communities around DCU.
2. Faculty tasters
   The Access service ran a series of 20 taster workshops in partnership with all faculties in February. In total, over 100 5th year students from our linked schools took part in these workshops in Glasnevin & St. Pats.
3. The Headstart in the Community programme ran a series of workshops for prospective mature students in DCU in the Community and Balbriggan/ Ballymun ETBs for approx. 40 students this semester.
4. The Empowering Communities initiative brought 20 youth & community workers together and aimed to support non-formal educators in their work with young people
   in a community setting.

Natalja Matease, Office of Civic Engagement

• The recipients of the 2024 President’s Awards for Engagement were announced by the Deputy President of DCU Professor Anne Sinnott on Thursday, April 11th in HG22 as follows:
  • Student Award: Mark Dunne
  • Staff Award: Sylwia Kazmierczak-Murray and Kathryn O'Mahony, with Alexis Carey, Independent Researcher
  • Student, Special Merit: Ishita Gupta
  • Staff, Special Merit: DCU’s Tanzania Pre-Primary Education team:
    Fiona Giblin, Catherine Mulryan-Kyne and Bernard Pierce
• We would like to congratulate the winners and we have invited them to join the Civic Engagement Forum
• We would like to thank all entrants & the judging panel
• A full list of nominees, winners and a photo gallery is available at: https://www.dcu.ie/civic-engagement/dcu-presidents-awards-engagement
• DCU News item: https://www.dcu.ie/commsteam/news/2024/apr/recipients-announced-dcu-presidents-awards-engagement

Una Redmond, Student Life 

• Delighted that one of our SU executive team won the Student Award for Engagement recently.
• We continue to offer free breakfast and non perishable groceries to students through to the end of exams
• Thanks to the current SU sabbaticals who have their last meeting of this group this week- they have contributed well throughout the year.

Roisin Blunnie, School of Theology, Philosophy, and Music

• The School of TPM's Spring Concert took place on 3 April in All Hallows church with a full audience of family, friends, colleagues, local community; 
• Irish Biblical Association Conference took place at All Hallows Campus on 8-9 March;
• Sounds of Dissent Research symposium took place at RSAI Merrion Sq and at St Patrick's Campus, 11-12 April.

Luke Quinlan, DCU Engaged Research 

• 2023/2024 Webinar Series The Power of Collaboration is to finish on Thursday
• 25 April with a presentation from Christine O'Kelly entitled Culture on Prescription Europe - The Ripple Effect on Collaborative Projects (For more info& to register: https://t.co/C7MDOJNuy8).
• recruiting speakers for 2024/2025 series will begin in May 2024 - If anyone would like to enquire please contact Luke, feel free to share with your colleagues.
• The PPN Summer School will take place this year - expanding as to include all 4 of the Dublin-based PPNs (Dublin City, Fingal, Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown, and
  South Dublin). It will take place from 27-30 May with a mixture of in-person & online capacity building workshops.
• DCU Engaged Research will begin creating a program of activities for 2024/2025 - if there is any interest in working with us, please contact Luke Quinlan.

Rosie Savage, School of Inclusive Special Education

This week (15th-19th Apr) Kathryn O Mahony hosted 25 teachers from special schools all over Ireland for an induction course on enhancing educational practice for learners with severe to profound general learning disabilities. 

The course has contributions from parents whose children attend local special schools in Dublin as well as Principals who have worked in this area in the Dublin region for almost 30 years. Previous attendees of the course consistently express how these sessions continue to impact their practice.

This is a short course (8 days) where teachers can attend lectures at DCU Institute of Education and their schools are provided funding from the Department of Education for a substitute teacher.

This course is currently non accredited but it acts as a gateway for teachers working with children with complex needs to attend our post graduate courses. Currently we are the only higher education provider of CPD for teachers that has a dedicated focus on learners with Severe to Profound GLD.

Aoife Brennan: The School has developed a partnership with Bank of Ireland to conduct research on inclusive workplaces. It's an €82K project. We will be launching a media release in the coming weeks.

Samantha Fahy, Sustainability

Sustainability Update

• The guidance from SEAI/EPA on the Climate Action Plan 2024 was published in Apr 24 and public sector bodies now have 6 months to complete their Climate Action Roadmaps in response to the Plan. There will be further engagement across the university in the development of this roadmap.
• Marchathon 2024 went well with 55 DCU teams from both staff and students – the winning DCU team was ‘The Ugly Step-Sisters’ – congrats to all who took part.
• Secure Cycle parking is being installed on the All Hallows campus and improvements are being made to the cycle parking facilities on St Patricks campus as well.

• The new BusConnects E1/E2 Spine is planned to go live in June 2024 at which point the other busses (4, 9, 11, 13, 155) along this route will cease. Along with the ESpine there will also be a new 19 route that will maintain the link between the GLA and AHC/SPC campuses while we await the delivery of the A route. Route 19 will run every 20 minutes throughout the day with additional short-run trips between Wadelai Park and Parnell Square at peak times. More info here: https://busconnects.ie/. 

  This is also a useful site to see the changes:
  https://sandbox.kevin.ie/busconnects_compare/
  DCU has joined the EAUC where is are lots of sustainability related resources for all staff and students to access – see here https://www.eauc.org.uk/member_zone

• There has been a series of meeting on ‘What should HEIs do about the planetary Crisis’ and the next meeting, which will take place in TU Dublin, Grangegorman Campus, on Thursday May 30th from 10:00-16:00. Focus on campaign for mandatory Education on Sustainable Development for all undergraduates on the island of Ireland - to move from ambition to action. You can sign-up here:
  https://www.eventbrite.ie/e/what-should-heis-do-about-the-planetary-crisis-from-ambition-to-action-tickets-885422240757?aff=oddtdtcreator
• The Centre for Climate and Society’s Annual Conference – Climate Justice across Generations was held in the Helix on 16 April – where the theatre was packed out to hear Mary Robinson continue to call for more action to address the climate and biodiversity emergency. 
• There was also a fantastic session with participants in Ireland’s Children and Young People’s Assembly on Biodiversity Loss. Well worth taking a look at the recording when they are available on the centre’s website -
  https://www.dcu.ie/climate

Leeanne Hinch, CTYI

• CTYI recently finished up our Spring term for Primary school students where we had ~800 primary school students on DCU campus each Saturday.
• We will shortly finish up Semester 2 of Early University Entrance (EUE), which is our programme for highly able TY students who come to DCU one day a week to take first year college modules. This semester we had ~300 students participate in EUE from all across Ireland, who commuted to DCU each week.
• We recently received separate grants to support highly able students from DEIS schools to attend specialised science programmes with us. 
• The SFI funded project Bright Minds, Brilliant Discoveries for 6th class pupils is currently ongoing, bringing ~30 DEIS students to DCU each week. 
• The RSC funded project Polymer Playground is just finished, and we hosted ~40 DEIS students in DCU each week. 
• In the coming months we will host another ~50 students on each of those projects.

Emma Monahan, DCUSU

• Darkness Into Light

Emer Nibhradaigh, Fiontar agus Scoil na Gaeilge

1. RevitaLESE Erasmus-funded project completed end January 2024. Revitalising Longer Established Social Enterprises. Five training modules (1 to 1.5 days each)
   available online and for free at: https://revitalese.eu. Topics: Assessing current situation; maximising digital resources; better social outcomes; implementing
   Green agenda; better economic outcomes. All materials - slides, lesson plans etc in 4 languages. Also 18 podcasts & 17 case studies.
2. Link established with Kinia, social enterprise re creativity, innovation education,
   via Irish language medium TechFéile held in Google Dublin HQ.
3. 200 students from local Gaelcholáistí attended Seachtain na Gaeilge events on
   AHC campus.
4. Bilingual Hackathon on Arranmore Island Donegal: BA Gnó & Gaeilge and
   MSc students with local community leaders in February.
   Una Mccabe, School of Arts Education and Movement
   Lucy Hill 1) YPCE/Arts Council Studio practice development in consultation with The Ark children’s council, mentored by Sarah Marsh (the sensory toolkit).
   2) Precious Yolks Early Years egg tempera workshop for Ukrainian families for VISUAL Carlow Andrea Cleary: In conjunction with Enfield Development Group,
   gathered like minded people to set up EDG Arts and the inception of the ‘Social Series’. So far we have an art group, a community choir, and beginners Ukuele social
   group, working in partnership with local business.

6. AOB
N/A

7. Next Meeting
Date of the next meeting: 09/10/2024

Dublin City University

Civic Engagement Forum

Minutes

Meeting of the DCU Civic Engagement Forum at 12.30pm Tuesday 21^st November 2023, FBR, INVENT, Glasnevin Campus+ Zoom

Attendance:

Christine O'Kelly, Rosie Savage, Eabhnat Ní Fhloinn, Roisin Blunnie Naadiya Carrim, Louise Hopper, Marcella Bannon, Emma Clarke, Michael Mullooly, Leah Ridgway, Pádraig Murphy, Deirdre Corby, Emer Ni Bhradaigh, Catriona Murphy, Maria Chernyakova, Adam Daly, Ryan Carey, Aisling Mc Kenna, Liam MacGabhann, Una Redmond, Luke Quinlan, Deiric Ó Broin, Natalja Matease, Justyna Byrzykowska, Peter Admirand, Hannah Goss.

Apologies:

Siobhán Seoighe, Agnés Maillot, Leeanne Hinch, Sylwia Kazmierczak-Murray, Una McCabe

1.Welcome

Deiric Ó Broin (Chairperson) welcomed the Civic Engagement Forum group and thanked them for attending, followed by introductions by each member.

2.Minutes

The previous minutes were proposed by Luke Quinlan and seconded by Justyna Byrzykowska. Minutes are available online at: https://www.dcu.ie/civic-engagement/civic-engagement-forum-minutes.

3.Matters arising

A new item has been added to Agenda: Civic Engagement Strategic Plan 

Reports and Updates received via the Google Form for today’s meeting  were shared with all members prior to the meeting and will be added to the Minutes of today’s meeting as well.Collating of information via the Google Form will be the core element of the future meetings and will provide an opportunity for the members to ask questions in relation to Reports & Updates during the meetings.

4.Civic Engagement Strategic Plan

Deiric Ó Broin briefed Civic Engagement Forum members on university approach to Strategic Planning and provided an overview of the following Civic Engagement pillars:

• DCU in the Community Offering / Community-Based Programmes
• Engaged Research
• Student Volunteering & Staff Volunteering
• Regional Engagement

Following discussion between Civic Engagement Forum members it was proposed to review and discuss how to capture and highlight broader Civic Engagement activities at the next meeting of the Civic Engagement Forum.

5.Reports and updates

Roisin Blunnie, School of Theology, Philosophy, and Music 

• The School recently hosted the International Vincentian Business Ethics Conference, in collaboration with De Paul, St John's, and Niagara Universities.
• Staff led workshops at the recent Post-Primary Music Teachers Assoc Conference, based on Erasmus+ project outcomes;
•  DCU Choral Leadership Day welcomes 100+ choral/music leaders on 20th January 2024;
• Staff contributed to organisation and presentation of recent Irish Theological Association Conference in TCD, on theme of 'War and Peace', with both staff and students participating in discussions on situation in Gaza and ongoing conflict elsewhere.
• Institute of Ethics staff working on assistive technologies with the National Disability Authority Ireland (NDAI)

Padraig Murphy, Faculty of HSS

ECIU: Meeting Bentley this week to look at Digital twins technology for emergency response as challenges for DCU modules; bilateral joint awards, mobility and research collaborations being identified. Agreed ECIU plan for FHSS. Engagement Governance: in process - protocols and due diligence for collaborating with CSOs/NGOs; one finalised for HEIs.

Louise Hopper, School of Psychology

I am PI on a number of projects that relate to dementia (policy, awareness, assistive technologies, and psychosocial models of care), health service use, healthy ageing including brain-health awareness and chronic illness prevention, and I am currently supervising two PhD students researching co-morbid cancer and dementia. I have incorporated PPI into my projects since before it was called PPI, including healthy older adults. I recruit PPI members through civic engagement. 

I am also running a Citizen Science and a Citizen Jury project; each kicked off during Science Week. 

Finally, I teach Community Psychology and I am keen to look at different ways to approach civic engagement (e.g. from a teaching, research and social perspective).

Deiric O’Broin, Office of Civic Engagement:

DCU's involvement in the region has recently related to small number of distinct areas of work, including the development of the:

(a) Local Economic and Community Plan for Dublin;

(b) Local Economic and Community Plan for Fingal;

(c) Economic Strategy for Fingal;

(d) Skills Strategy for Fingal;

(e) Dublin-Belfast Economic Corridor Network.

The first two are statutory processes and more details are available at https://www.dublincity.ie/residential/improving-my-community/local-economic-and-community-plan-2016-2021/about-dublin-city-local-economic-community-plan-2016-2021 and https://www.fingal.ie/news/fingals-local-economic-and-community-plan-lecp-2023-2028-consultation.

More information on the Skills Strategy for Fingal is available at https://www.fingal.ie/skills-strategy. This is a novel area of work for DCU as this is first local government skills strategy in Ireland and DCU's involvement reflects the very strong collaborative relations development with Fingal County Council over recent years.

DCU's involvement with the Dublin-Belfast Economic Corridor network (DBEC), see https://www.dbec.info/for more details, is in partnership with Ulster University and both universities have played a key role in the development of the network.

Catriona Murphy, School of Nursing, Psychotherapy and Community Health:

• Presentation on the NEX project and tour of the NEX living lab as part of the Taste of DCU hosted by DCU Age Friendly University, Sep 1st (C Murphy)
• Launch of the Public and Patient Involvement (PPI) Ignite Festival 2023, Oct 2nd (L Whiston)
• Communicating Together to inform Palliative and Healthcare Research Patient and Public Involvement Workshop, Oct 9th (L Whiston)
• Mental Health, Spirituality and Psychotherapy, SNPCH Tattered couch public psychotherapy lecture series, Oct 19th (R O Neill)
• Dementia and ageing inclusion using virtual reality tools open event for National Positive Ageing Week, hosted by the SNPCH in collaboration with DCU Age Friendly University, Oct 4th (C Murphy)
• Secrets worth Sharing: How to talk about childhood sexual abuse, SNPCH Tattered couch public psychotherapy lecture series, Nov 9th (R O Neill)
• Launch of the UNFPA State of the World Population Report Nov 14th (Anne Matthews) https://www.dcu.ie/science-and-health/news/2023/nov/state-world-population-report-2023-launched-dcus-school-nursing  and https://tinyurl.com/UNFPA-Launch-2023
• Queer and Here support group for LGBTQ refugees and asylum seekers which the SNPCH DCU co-facilitates with Outhouse (R O Neill) https://queerandhere.jimdosite.com/
• Gheel autism services: SNHS providing once-monthly supervision consultancy to support setting up and overseeing peer supervision groups for staff. (A McMahon)
• St John of God Services: SNHS providing supervisor training for occupational therapists and speech and language therapists in Lucena services (A McMahon)
• National Educational Psychology Services (NEPS): SNPCH provided Two-day supervisor training for NEPS staff. (A McMahon)
• Co-facilitation of the Hearing Voices Network Dublin group (M Farrelly)
• Providing support to set up community-based Alzheimer’s cafes in Spain similar to Irish model, SNPCH in collaboration with the Global Brain Institute (K Irving) 
• Celebrating stories through objects, a dementia focused community based creative arts program in Mayo and Dublin (K Irving)

Una Redmond, Student Life:

• Usual SU events for Christmas planned- night time event.   
• Society engagement is also healthy Thai semester.   
• Noteworthy though are the initiatives that we are putting in place for cost-of-living crisis students are facing. 
• Free breakfast, pantry for essentials, more microwaves and free hot water.   
• Also investigating adapting some spaces in the U for smaller engagement opportunities like crafting, games or meeting other commuter students.   
• We are also promoting the participation fund to allow access students take part in Clubs and Socs activities. 
• Finally, we are running a survey to find out what our students lives look like. Entitled “ We are all ears”, there are already over 4,000 responses.   We will use this data to inform our activities and our next strategic plan. 

Deirdre Corby, PATH 4 call:

The DCU Ability Project ran for 4.5 years and finished in December 2022, we worked with young adults with disabilities, their service provider, their families, and employers, to help them in finding suitable education, training and employment. The impact of the project is continuing with two engagements within the community.

• ‘Work Ready’ Programme Development. The City of Dublin ETB Barry Road, Finglas and Down Syndrome Ireland are currently working on developing 5 preparations for work modules for people with a variety of abilities.  The objective of each module will be to prepare students for their work role, making the transition to work easier for both the person and the employer. 
• St John of God Service, Kildare are also working on a project similar to the DCU Ability Project.

I am providing practical and consultative support to both these projects. 

Overall, for these and other projects it is about sharing the learning from the DCU Ability Project to support groups who are in turn engaging and empowering people with intellectual disabilities.

Laurence van der Haegen, Access Outreach Officer:

A number of events held on campus for College Awareness Month (November): 

• Combining Sports & College in collaboration with Sports & Wellbeing: An info session for anyone interested in Sports and curious about all supports offered by Sports & Wellbeing and DCU Access.
• Teaching as a Career, in collaboration with local partnerships: DCU students shared their experience with students aspiring to become teachers.
• Empowering Communities: Introductory workshops for youth workers community educators on access to third-level education
• Ongoing school outreach programmes: HEAR & DARE, Weekly maths drop-ins, etc.

Luke Quinlan, Centre for Engaged Research:

CER

• The CER webinar series for 2023/2024 is fully organised and we have completed 2 so far; Robert Gillanders and Samantha Fahy, where combined we had over 35 attendees. Our next webinar welcomes Deiric O'Broin and Paula Dolan on 30 Nov. 2023. (Go to CER webpage for more info/ to register)
• The Engaged Research Festival will take place on 11 December 2023. Registration is free and open to all. This event will take place in the Helix Gallery from 8.45 - 13.30, and it will consist of international speakers, panel discussions from DCU researchers and a small exhibition of some of DCU's research activities. (ask Luke Quinlan for registration details). 
• CER is currently going through some structural changes; such as a changing of the guard in our steering committee members, and hope to have a new strategy in place in January 2024.

Office of Civic Engagement

• The DCU in the Community's iteration of the Head Start in the Community course, created and funded by College Connect, started on 15 Nov. 2023. This program has been designed to offer potential future mature students a chance to work on the soft skills and hard skills needed for higher education. The course will run from 15 Nov. 2023 - 14 Feb. 2024, with a break at Xmas time. 
• DCU has been represented at a number of Northside Partnership events recently, most notably the Northside Partnership Community Forum. 
• The office of civic engagement is making inroads to forming a more effective partnership with the Dublin North-West Partnership

Natalja Matease, Office of Civic Engagement:

Presidents Awards for Engagement 2024

The DCU President has approved the working group's proposal to him in September and Stuart Heenan is working on the new webpage which will promote the President’s Awards and will streamline the application process. The working group will meet again this Wednesday 22nd November.

DCU in the Community

• Very successful and well attended acrylic painting workshops were held in August, September and October 2023. Due to high demand, it has been decided to continue acrylic painting workshops in QTR4 (December 2023 -January 2024). 86 students attended acrylic painting workshops in total throughout the QTR 3. https://www.dcu.ie/civic-engagement/news/2023/oct/acrylic-painting-workshops-november-2023
• 33 students enrolled for the new 6 weeks Introduction to Psychology course which started in November 2023. https://www.dcu.ie/civic-engagement/news/2023/oct/introduction-psychology

Ryan Carey, SS&D Widening Participation (College Connect):

Awarded funding under the Ireland Against Racism fund along with SALIS for voter education/registration workshops for refugees/IP applicants for the 2024 local elections and anti-racism training videos

Rosie Savage, School of Inclusive & Special Education

• Paula Lehane in the School of Inclusive and Special Education acts as Patron Rep on Shellybanks ETNS' Board of Management and speaks to staff when requested by principal.
• Sylwia Kazmierczak-Murray has authored an Information Booklet for Parents on Support Pathways for Children with Additional Needs, which was recently launched in partnership with the Childhood Development Initiative, Tallaght.
• Elizabeth Mathews is providing CPD training to the deafness SIG of the Irish Association of Speech and Language Therapists.

Masha Chernyakova, Physical Sciences

• Dr. Paul van Kampen chaired the NCCA's Leaving Cert Physics Development Group
• Dr. Paul van Kampen run the Irish Olympiad of Experimental Science
• Dr. Masha Chernyakova and Dr. Oisin Creaner make presentations for general public during the DCU science week.

Justyna Byrzykowska, DCU Volunteer

• Two Volunteer Fair’s were organised this year to reach and engage with a diverse number of students from two campuses. St. Patrick’s Campus Fair took place on the 9th of October, and the Glasnevin Campus Fair on the 10th of October.25 organisations attended. A survey was conducted on both days, 132 students have filled it out. This allowed for a better understanding of student volunteering needs in DCU and for feedback on the Volunteer Fair’s. 
• Attended a Volunteer Coordinator meet-up in TUD. It was the first coordinator meet-up since Covid-19.

6.AOB

• Time and dates of the next Civic Engagement meetings to be reviewed at the next meeting
• Knowledge broker events, details to follow

7.Next Meeting

The next meeting on 30th January 2024 has been rescheduled to 7^th February 2024 @12.30pm

Dublin City University

Civic Engagement Forum

Minutes

Meeting of the DCU Civic Engagement Forum at 10am , Tuesday 25^th April 2023, A204, Glasnevin Campus + Zoom

Attendance:

Adam Daly, Deiric Ó Broin, Luke Quinlan, Úna Redmond, Justyna Byrzykowska,  Antoinette Patton, Leeanne Hinch, Aisling Mc Kenna, Ryan Carey, Nathan Murphy, Samantha Fahy, Emer Ni Bhradaigh, Deirdre Corby, Grainne Reddy, Natalja Matease, Carine Mambou, Shaun O'Boyle, Agnés Maillot.

Apologies:

Laura Mahoney, Liam Macgabhann, Pádraig Murphy, Siobhán Seoighe, Emma Clarke.

Welcome 

Deiric Ó Broin (Chairperson) welcomed all existing and new members of the Civic Engagement.

Minutes

The previous minutes were proposed by Samantha Fahy and seconded by Nathan Murphy. Minutes are available online at: https://www.dcu.ie/civic-engagement/civic-engagement-forum-minutes

Matters arising

N/A

President's Awards for Engagement

Deiric Ó Broin provided an overview of President's Awards for Engagement process including judging and flagged that the review of the President’s Awards process is still ongoing.

Deiric thanked everyone involved and congratulated the winners of this year’s President’s Awards for Engagement. 

Civic Engagement forum membership

Deiric Ó Broin briefed Civic Engagement Forum members on the key objectives of the Forum. The University's Civic Engagement Forum has been in operation for approximately 12 years (terms of reference are available at: https://www.dcu.ie/civic-engagement/civic-engagement-forum ) and we are currently seeking nominations to the Forum for the coming 2-3 years.

The Research offices at university and all the schools were invited to nominate a representative to the University's Civic Engagement Forum and we are expecting much broader representation from the research centres and schools for the next meeting.

Reports and updates

Samantha Fahy, Sustainability

• DCU have submitted to the SEAI and HEA the Climate Action Roadmap 2023. The implementation of this plan (i.e. a 51% reduction in energy-related greenhouse gas GHG emissions by 2030) will impact everyone and everything we do
• All senior management in the university is going for climate leadership training
• DCU Green Week was held in March 2023

Úna Redmond, Student Life and  Nathan Murphy, DCUSU

• The semester is finished & student activities are down now
• Preparations for the Darkness into Light event, May 6th. Volunteers are welcome. 
• Club and Societies awards were held on the 31st March 
• SU Elections: a new SU team is taking over in June
• There are 3 DCU students have been elected to USI next year

Aisling Mc Kenna, Quality Promotion Office

Aisling Mc Kenna provided a brief overview of applications and successful QUID Projects for 2023. The QUID funding call was successful and completed.

Justyna Byrzykowska, Volunteering

• A lot of positive feedback received from organizations who participated in the DCU Volunteer Fair 2023 in February
• Our new initiative the Volunteer HUB focuses on delivering volunteering advise, promotions, event assistance and networking opportunities to local communities. The Volunteer HUB takes place every Tuesday morning in DCU in the Community centre in Ballymun.
• There is no active GAISCE Pal at the moment and Justyna agreed to do the training
• There is a national volunteering week in Galway next week

Grainne Reddy, Age Friendly University

• Love of Life Long Learning Programme modules have just finished
• This week is a Global Intergenerational week, and all are welcome to attend
• A very successful 6 weeks paint classes were held in St Pat’s
• AFU Global Network is now moving to Arizona State University

Luke Quinlan, Centre for Engaged Research

• The current lecture series are coming to an end and another lecture series are planned for autumn/winter. 
• Ongoing preparatory work on DCU orientated staff training for Community Based Research 
• PPN summer school organised by the Centre for Engaged Research will take place from 29th May to 2nd June
• A new initiative “Community Research HUB” will start tomorrow in DCU in the Community Centre, Ballymun. It will focus on working with and providing a research capacity for community members and local organisations.

Emer Ní Bhrádaigh, Fiontar & Scoil na Gaeilge

• Claire Farrell was appointed as an Innovation, Creativity & Innovation (ICE) Project Lead
• Enactus Ireland National Competition 2023 will take place on the 1st of June
• A Revitalize project requires a part-time research assistant asap

AOB

It was agreed to go digital and do not print Agenda & Minutes for the Civic Engagement Forum Meetings from now on.

Next Meeting

Date of the next meeting: TBC.

Dublin City University

Civic Engagement Forum

Minutes

Hybrid Meeting of the DCU Civic Engagement Forum at 12.30 pm, Tuesday 4^th October 2022,

INVENT+ Zoom

Attendance:

Deiric Ó Broin, Luke Quinlan, Samantha Fahy, Siobhán Seoighe, Nathan Murphy, Natalja Matease, Joanna Ozarowska, Aisling McKenna, Emer Ni Bhradaigh, Justyna Byrzykowska, Una Redmond.

Apologies:

Laura Mahoney, Padraig Murphy.

1. Welcome

Deiric Ó Broin (Chairperson) welcomed all members of the Civic Engagement.

2. Minutes

The previous minutes were proposed by Aisling McKenna  and seconded by Samantha Fahy. Minutes are available online at: https://www.dcu.ie/engagement/civic-engagement-forum-minutes

3. Matters Arising

N/A.  Ongoing review of the President’s Awards process.

4. Reports and updates

Samantha Fahy, Sustainability:

• Sustainability office have moved to All Hallows Campus, Drumcondra house
• Over 70 teams from DCU are participating in Walktober
• They university expects to have carbon budgets by the end of the year
• The green flag has been raised on the All Hallows Campus
• Bike clinics are on Glasnevin Campus on a weekly basis and every second week on All Hallows and St. Pat’s
• Waste prevention and segregation - virtual game is being piloted in DCU, Maynooth and UCD

Emer Ní Bhrádaigh, Fiontar & Scoil na Gaeilge

• The Revitalize project led by the Wheel moving along nicely
• MSc in management and digital business has the highest numbers ever (22students)

Deiric Ó Broin, Office of Civic Engagement

• The Innovation in Politics Institute is looking for 10 000 members to sit on the citizens jury

Luke Quinlan, Centre for Engaged Research

• The new Centre for Engagement website (https://www.dcu.ie/engaged-research) is up and running
• The online lecture series are ongoing at the moment

Nathan Murphy, DCUSU:

• DCU SU is at the final stretch of Freshers Month 2022
• A national Student Walkout: Thursday 13^th October at 11:11am
• An Irish Officer By-Election is next week

Siobhán Seoighe

• Ongoing work on revitalizing of an Cumann Gaelach
• A diploma through the medium of Irish (level B2) course starts next week on St Pat’s Campus
• The provisions in section 10A of the language act will come into effect on 10th October 2022. More details to be provided.

Aisling McKenna

• DCU Fuse is taking place on Friday 21st October
• Coffee Morning - Thursday 20th October

Joanna Ozarowska, DCU in the Community

• All education programmes are running smoothly at the centre
• DCU in the Community is hosting a Recovery College Programme at the centre
• Many applications were received from newcomers who are now residing near the DCU in the Community centre, but due to the level of English, it was not possible to accept the applications.

Justyna Byrzykowska, Volunteering

• A lot of students’ interest about general volunteering opportunities
• Not much engagement from St. Pat’s students. Any ideas how to get St. Pat’s and All Hallows students more involved are welcome.

Úna Redmond, Student Life:

• An encouraging start for Clubs & societies with lots of new joiners
• Virtual helpdesk & membership are continuing successfully

5. AOB

The Civic Engagement Forum members list is to be updated.

6. Next Meeting

Date of the next meeting: Tuesday 6th December 2022 (All Hallows)

Dublin City University

Civic Engagement Forum

Minutes

Hybrid Meeting of the DCU Civic Engagement Forum at 12.00 pm, Tuesday 8^th February 2022, A204 + Zoom

Attendance:

Apologies:

Padraig Murphy, Una Redmond.

1. Welcome

Deiric Ó Broin (Chairperson), welcomed new and existing members of the Civic Engagement Forum and introduced Laura Mahoney Executive Director of Engagement.

2. Minutes

The previous minutes were signed off by Civic Engagement Forum members. Minutes are available online at: https://www.dcu.ie/engagement/civic-engagement-forum-minutes

3. Matters Arising

It was agreed to move future meeting times from 10am to 12pm to facilitate attendance. The next meeting will be held on Tuesday 10^th May at 10am.

4. President’s Awards for Engagement 2022

• Call for nominations was sent in January 2022
• Deadline for receipt of nominations Monday, 14th February
• It will be the in person event and the awards ceremony is scheduled for 27th April

5. Reports and updates

Mariana Colman, Centre for Engaged Research

• Preparation for the lecture series which will be held during April – June period
• Training session for DCU staff will be held this week with over 100 participants registered for the session
• Ongoing work on the preparation for the Summer school with the Public Participation Network (PPN)

Siobhán Seoighe

A Special Screening of the Film Arracht, followed by an interview and Q&A with the film's writer and director, Tomás Ó Súilleabháin has been rescheduled to 16th February 6pm. The event is free and all are welcome.

Ross, DCUSU:

• DCUSU election campaign started yesterday
• Green Week 7 - 11March
• The RAG week is next week
• Clubs and Societies are doing very well with a lot of events on

Samantha Fahy, Sustainability:

• Some Green Week events will be held online and some face to face on campus
• Bicycle workshops and bike safety awareness week is next week, 16th February
• National carbon budgets have been approved by Oireachtas committee
• 2030 target: reduction of energy emissions by 51%

Juliette Kinsey, Age Friendly University:

• A new credit module was set up in January
• Love of Lifelong Learning modules are ongoing
• Organisation of Events for Global Intergenerational week for Ireland, a new website was set up https://giwireland.com/
• Dublin Learning City Festival encouraged by UNESCO
• Traceus Project, COPE project

Liam MacGabhann, Recovery College:

• A well-attended transcultural music and dialogue event was held in DCU SOLAS room in January
• Ongoing work with the EU partners on ERASMUS grant
• Continue to provide normal programmes as usual
• Wider engagement initiative: Community Development Mental Help Network

Joanna Ozarowska, DCU in the Community:

• Continue to provide regular programmes
• Currently recruiting for 3 QQI level 5 and level 6 courses that will be starting in 3 weeks
• Continue to provide education guidance and assistance with college applications to adults returning to education
• Ruth Lynam, Student Volunteer Coordinator moved to the NGO and DCU in the Community is recruiting for paid student internship

Veronica Crosbie, University of Sanctuary

• The outdoor We Are Here|HEAR exhibition is coming to DCU at 11am on 1st March 2022
• Lorraine Mcilrath is a new chair of the University of Sanctuary Ireland
• SALIS continues to support many projects every year

Emer Ní Bhrádaigh, Fiontar & Scoil na Gaeilge

• The Revitalize project kick off meeting is scheduled for this week, more details to follow.
• Grow it yourself projects: 2 positions are available in the sustainability and data analytics areas

Laura Mahoney, Executive Director of Engagement

Laura provided a brief overview of her new role which she took on 3 months ago and thanked Civic Engagement Forum members for interesting updates and for inviting her to the meeting.

Mary Rose Sweeney, Head of School, School of Nursing, Psychotherapy and Community Health  

“As I am edging towards the end of my term as Head of School I hope to have more time to devote to research so am very happy to link in with this group again. Daire has asked me to revaluate the Autism Friendly Project impact for autistic students on the ground at DCU so I hope to start working on this soon. It’s been running for 3 years now so a good time to look at this. We are also planning a new arm of the study to support staff who have family members who are autistic who might like supports”.

6. AOB

Date of the next meeting: Tuesday 10th May at 10am.