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The first item in the Trinity College Dublin (TCD) news feed at present is the report that Professor Petros Florides was recently inaugurated as a Pro-Chancellor of the University of Dublin. This reminds me that I often hear the question: “what is the University of Dublin for?”. And in the context of NUI Galway, NUI Maynooth, UCC, UCD et al, I often hear the similar question: “what is the NUI for?” Answers to these questions usually focus on history. The Charter of 1592 which founded TCD established it as “mother of a university”; whilst the Irish Universities Act, 1908 consolidated many of the existing Irish universities and colleges into the National University of Ireland. However, these answers only tell us where the University of Dublin and the NUI came from. They don’t tell us what these institutions are for. Other answers focus on degree-awarding powers, commencements, graduations, university governance, elections, connections with alumni, and ancillary academic services, before trailing off into a slightly embarrassed silence. These answers certainly get closer to telling us what these institutions are for, but they don’t really offer a strong justification for their continuing existence or future relevance. I’m actually a fan of both; and I think that the University of Dublin is symbiotically integral to Trinity College Dublin.…

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Some time ago, I mused that Irish universities seeking the freedom to set their own fees might decide to “de-nationalise” and “go private” by means of a Unilateral Declaration of Independence, but I concluded then that it would never happen. Some time later, the old adage “never say never” proved itself once again, as I noted that the rector of Imperial College London suggested that Imperial, Oxford, Cambridge, the LSE and UCL should go private and form an independent US-style Ivy League. Earlier this year, Ferdinand von Prondzynski also speculated about this issue on his blog. Last week, things moved from speculation closer to reality: the Sunday Telegraph reported that Cambridge University is beginning to consider going private for precisely that reason, and the the Guardian yesterday reported that the LSE is doing likewise, amid fears a rise in tuition fees will not be enough to allow them to do what they already do let alone to compete with elite US universities. Of course, there are less drastic solutions, but the abolition of teaching grants for the humanities in the UK following the Browne Report might be the spur to this course of action:

Andrew Oswald, an economist and professor of behavioural science at Warwick Business School, says … “I certainly expect to see a number of large private universities of the kind that can rival the best on the east coast of America in my lifetime,” ….

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