Eyepatch

the second day of the internship was even better than the first.

I sat in on an incredible committee meeting for higher education issues.

The story is: the state pays for all tuition here (luck of the Irish), however, the students are required to pay a fee. The fee is in three parts, a registration fee, an examination fee, and a student services fee. In 2008, the fee was 900 Euros. This past school year the fee jumped to 1500 Euros. A large portion of this money is not being accounted for, there’s hardly any transparency, no oversight, and the students are not being consulted on the spending of the services fee like the government suggests.

So two Thursdays ago, the presidents of the seven universities in Ireland all came to the committee to answer questions about their spending and such. Student presidents from the universities also attended, and I sat by them in the spectator gallery. It was great sitting by them and seeing their reactions to the questions and such. They had drafted a letter saying none of them had ever been consulted on how to spend the fee money. And the presidents said they had been consulted, but maybe they (the students) just didnt understand how things worked. It seemed ridiculous, and I tried to stay objective, but I found myself siding with the students.

Deputy Hayes pressed the presidents hard on a lot of questions, and I was shocked at their answers. They seemed so slimy and unresponsive. That’s normally the general view on politics anyway, I guess...

What it ended up boiling down to is that there isn’t even a working definition on what a student service is versus a core element of the university (something the students cannot be charged for). And the Minister of Education wasn’t even there. Hayes quipped, “its like Hamlet without the prince.” Also, it came out during the meeting that O’Keeffe never asked the Presidents to take a pay cut. [While teachers, nurses and pretty much every civil servant in Ireland has already had at least a 7% cut, facing another 5-7.]

On a side note, one of the presidents had an eye-patch. It was incredible, most of the presidents looked like Bond villains and he completed the part. It was like a Bond movie, only the Irish government version… I loved all of it. EYE PATCH. Seriously, highlight of the day.

In the afternoon, Hayes had priority questions. Priority questions occur for the different ministries about once every six weeks. The spokesperson asks the minister questions (about 3 or 4) and the minister responds. And then they argue. And then the speaker hits the bell, and then they move forward. The questions this session were about the dissolving of the National University of Ireland system and the school closings that happened during the big ice and snow storms that happened at the beginning of the month.

Last week was good too. Tuesday was uneventful and slow. Had really good, although European and mild, sushi for lunch. I worked on constituent database stuff, basically merging duplicate voters.

Thursday, very similar, swap the sushi for an amazing gourmet chicken satay burger (€5, best deal in Dublin), and add in a constituent meeting I got to sit in on.

the minister wanted to put more technology into schools. a laptop and digital projector for every classroom. he put together a board of advisors and the board just happened to include high-ups at the 5 multi-national computer companies in Ireland. Deputy Hayes and I met with 3 men who sell refurbished computers. They're concerned because the main layout of the bill that was passed allocating money to schools for technology basically says schools can only buy from the 5 companies. So essentially it seems like a cartel. And its just another accusation of government in bed with big business. Something new and shocking for me, I'm from the states!

And during this meeting, I was privy to my first ever off-the-record comment. Best internship ever. Overall, I think this is going to be the amazing experience I hoped for. I’m excited to see what transpires next.