Tommy Collison

Back in July, I did Journalism in CTYI, which took place in DCU. The class do a short newspaper each year, chronicling events that took place over the 3 weeks. This was one of my articles for it:

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Béibhinn Irish Cummins and Tommy Collison caught up with DCU’s President Brian Mac Craith in what he told us was his first ever interview after com- ing into office during the first week of CTYI: Session 2.

Over the precious 15 minutes afforded to us, we grilled the President on such issues such as his opinions on CTYI (his son’s a TA!), his thoughts on DCU and what the future holds.

We began by asking the obvious question – “what do you think of CTYI?”.

“It’s fantastic!” he laughs, telling us how it gives the kids a chance to develop a broad range of skills and also serves as introduction to college life (something some students had already picked up on). “Cliff Bernstein” he tells us, in what is almost a conspiratorial whisper, referring to the famed manager of Metallica, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and an AWESOME beard, “is a big fan of the program”.

When asked to describe an average day as President of DCU, he tells us how he starts his day at 8 (later than us — no fair!) and spends his day in meetings, “making connections and alliances”.
We then brought him on to the subject of DCU – “it’s the best” he
jokes, smiling. “We’re punching above our weight” he tells us, now serious. “Nobody works closer with the industry and enterprise sectors”. He goes on to explain how DCU is a modern and dynamic university and shall continue to be.

Oddly, the President refused to voice his opinion on college fees – an area his predecessor was quite outspoken about. He offered this comment: “we’re saying to the government: ‘the cuts have to stop’.”
“What challenges does DCU face?” we asked. He stopped to think about this one, before continuing “well, they’re [challenges faced] are not unique to us [DCU]. There’s the resource problem as well as the fact that the jobs we’ll have in 2015 don’t exist at the moment”, he went onto say, echoing California-based technology investor Paul Graham’s thoughts, that “…there are other jobs you can’t learn about, because no one is doing them yet. Most of the work I’ve done in the last ten years didn’t exist when I was in high school.”

To finish on a light note, we asked the President about his inauguration, specifically the music which received much acclaim. “I thoroughly enjoyed it” he told us brightly. Our time was then up. We took a few photographs and shook hands once again as he left us with this promise:

“We will continue to support CTYI”

I think we speak on behalf of all students that CTYIziens* everywhere will be hold-ing Professor McCraith to that promise.

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* CTYIziens — Affectionate title CTYI attendees give themselves, modeled on the word ‘citizen’.