Maynooth and Dundalk?
Life is full of surprises, especially if you’re a member of academic staff at Maynooth University.
Today it was revealed that the institution that employs me is planning to merge with Dundalk Institute of Technology. It was revealed not in a direct message to staff, but through an article in the national media, in this case the Sunday Independent. The article there is paywalled but there is another piece here.
This is astonishing news, not least because of the way it has come out. Yet again, the only way that staff at Maynooth can find out what’s going on is through the newspapers. Senior Management don’t deign to inform us of anything. Yet again it is also an anonymous “source” conveying the news.
For those of you interested, it is about 100km by road from Maynooth to Dundalk, so it’s difficult to see how a merger could be practically feasible even if it were desirable. More importantly, there are now questions about whether staff and even entire departments in either institution will have to relocate and how many redundancies are planned.
Will we get answers to such questions, though. Given current experience at Maynooth, I very much doubt we will find out from the Management here…
In the Dark 
August 6, 2023 at 10:36 pm
That is strange news. You have to wonder what goes on in the minds of university managers.
It reminds me of the idea that the then Welsh Assembly Government had of merging Bangor University and Glyndŵr University in Wrexham (or were they the University of Wales Bangor and the University of Wales Wrexham in those days?). Fortunately nothing came of that: the two campuses would have been ridiculously far apart, too far for students reasonably to travel. The University of Glamorgan merged with the University of Wales Newport, and eventually the Caerleon campus was closed, ending university education in Newport.
I remember the time around 1986-1988 when University College Cardiff was in financial crisis. The only real way to find out what was going on was by buying the Western Mail. That even applied to news about the immediate, outright closure of some departments.
Let’s hope the proposed Irish merger does not go ahead.
August 7, 2023 at 11:33 am
There is the remarkable career of Prof Medwin Hughes, CBE
Medwin started off being in charge of Carmarthen College. This became a University.
Medwin then took over the older, but troubled, Lampeter University. He then took over Swansea Metropolitan University, and along the way picked up the new SA1 campus in Swansea as well.
UWTSD now has campuses all over the place; Carmarthen, Lampeter, Cardiff, Swansea city, Wuhan, Birmingham, London and the new waterfront campus in Swansea.
Of course, it is a completely unsustainable model of learning.
Medwin was on a salary on £ 240 000. He has just retired (end of July), should you wish to apply for the Vice Chancellorship of UWTSD & run campuses all over the place.
I think the main driver of this is always administrative imperialism. I doubt it saves money, or has any discernible research and teaching benefits.
August 7, 2023 at 12:23 pm
I predict that if it goes ahead, there will be cuts in academic staff numbers but these will be more than offset by an increase in administrators.
August 7, 2023 at 1:55 pm
The empire building of the University of Wales Trinity Saint David is indeed a strange process, particularly given the number of campuses. Carmarthen and Lampeter are not so distant so there may have been logic in a merger between them. A Swansea merger between Swansea Metropolitan University and Swansea University might have made more sense.
August 7, 2023 at 6:36 am
The University of Ulster has campuses in Belfast and Derry, which are about 100 km apart. Also has a campus outside Coleraine.
August 8, 2023 at 10:25 am
Charles Sturt University in New South Wales has campuses in Albury-Wodonga, Wagga Wagga, Bathurst, Orange, Dubbo and Port Maquarie. The distance from Albury to Port Maquarie as the cockatoo flies is 750 km; driving distance is 930 km.
Dundalk IT is the only one of the “generalist” ITs (polytechnics) in Ireland not to have merged with others into a technological university. It would be very precarious without a university partner. It made sense for them to seek a merger with either TU Dublin, Dublin City University, or Maynooth.
Maynooth University used to have a campus in Kilkenny, which is further away than Dundalk.
August 8, 2023 at 10:52 am
Does this development suggest that Maynooth is bidding for TU status?
P.S. The Maynooth campus in Kilkenny closed in 2018.
August 8, 2023 at 11:53 am
Why does it make “sense for them [Dundalk IT] to seek a merger with either TU Dublin, Dublin City University, or Maynooth.”
Are there not advantages in being small? I might expect classes/lectures in DKIT are smaller and more hands on than in a larger University like Maynooth.
Why do bigger Universities have to swallow smaller Universities (also prevalent in Wales as Bryn has pointed out).
This seems to view Universities as living in a world of apex predators.
There are loads of small US liberal arts colleges. They have not been swallowed by the big East Coast Universities. They offer something distinct and different.
And if Maynooth ultimately closed Kilkenny campus, I’d be worried about the long-term if I worked in DKIT.
August 8, 2023 at 5:13 pm
But larger institutions have more managers, so must be better.
August 8, 2023 at 6:30 pm
I think there are indeed advantages of being small, and also do not think the craze for every college becoming a university is particularly well thought through. But given that all the other ITs have now merged to form these TUs, it is hard to deny that DKIT finds itself out on a limb as the only one without university status and hence may want to explore alliances.
August 12, 2023 at 11:27 pm
[…] this week the President of Maynooth University sent around a missive to all staff about the news that had leaked out about the proposed merger with Dundalk IT. That email referred twice to the “summer break”. It is ironic that such wording should […]
November 19, 2025 at 5:30 pm
[…] couple of years ago I posted an item about the news of a proposed merger of Maynooth University and Dundalk Institute of Technology. […]