Minister launches book from HERC: Monday 9 July

 On Monday 9 July in the State Rooms of Dublin Castle, the Minister of Education and Skills, Mr Ruairi Quinn TD launched a new book, co-edited by the Director of HERC, Professor Maria Slowey entitled 'Global Perspectives on Higher Education and Lifelong Learners'. 

The launch took place at a reception hosted by The Irish Research Council as the local hosts for a major international conference organised by NET4SOCIETY- an EU supported network of all the National Contact Points for research in the social sciences and humanities. 

Professor Maria Slowey, DCU 

The welcome and introduction to the book launch was provided by Dr. Eukaria Meehan, Head of Research Programmes and Capital Programmes at Higher Education Authority and also the interim director of the Irish Research Council (a new body launched in March 2012 as the result of the merger of the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences and (IRCHSS) and the Irish Research Council for Science, Engineering and Technology (IRCSET)) 

Dr Eukaria Meehan, Interim Director, Irish Research Council; Minister for Education & Skills, Mr Ruairi Quinn TD; Dr Angela Schindler-Daniels, Co-ordinator Network4Society and Professor Maria Slowey, DCU

Published in London and New York by Routledge, this book builds on earlier OECD work and is the result of a study coordinated by Professors Maria Slowey and Hans G.Schuetze (Emeritus Professor and previous Director of the Centre for Policy Studies in Higher Education, University of British Columbia). It explores developments in higher education and lifelong learning in 14 countries; six from Europe (Ireland Austria, Germany, Portugal, Sweden and the UK) North America (Canada, USA and Mexico) Japan, Australia, New Zealand and two BRICS countries (Brazil and South Africa) between 2000-2010. 

 Mr Ruairi Quinn TD

The Minister of Education and Skills, Mr Ruairi Quinn TD, welcomed the publication and congratulated the authors. In his speech Minister expressed a strong commitment to lifelong learning, highlighting that people have a ‘hunger for learning’ and that it is important to find ways of providing opportunities to gain access to higher education at all stages of life. Comparative studies such as this book offer examples from which much can be learnt.