Dundalk Credit Union

Establishes a Student

Innovation Fund at DkIT

“With the downturn in the economy, the

concept of self-employment is now becoming a real career option for third level graduates”. This is according to Sean McEntee, Incubation Centre Manager, Dundalk Institute of Technology, speaking at the launch of the Dundalk Credit Union Student Innovation Fund on Friday. There are two key ingredients in the recipe for a successful business. The first is

creativity and the second is finance. While the former has to be left up to the devices of the entrepreneur him/herself, Dundalk Credit Union have decided to be of assistance in the latter. The Credit Union which is celebrating its 40th year has created the Dundalk Credit Union Student Innovation Fund at DkIT, to mark its anniversary & to give something back to the community which it has been a part of for four decades.

The Fund

The €15,000 fund is the first of its kind in Ireland. Dundalk CU has agreed to provide essential funding for 3rd Level Student projects & innovation that show potential for commercial success and will provide for marketing, prototyping and other related costs for approved projects.

The fund was launched by the Minister for Justice Equality and Law Reform, Mr Dermot Ahern TD on Friday last at the Dundalk Credit Union Office. Speaking at the launch Mr Ahern commented that “ this most welcome and positive initiative by Dundalk Credit Union – the first of its kind in the country, should serve as a template for other organisations and Institutes to repli-cate.

Billy Doyle General Manager of Dundalk Credit Union expressed his Boards delight at being able to support Student Enterprise at DkIT, “This is a novel idea which we believe will result in many more students exploring new venture creation and ultimately self employment, something badly needed in these challenging times. As part of our 40th Celebrations we are delighted to be able to make this positive and meaningful financial commitment to both DKIT and Dundalk itself.”

How The Fund Will Operate

Applicants will be required to show some evidence that a market exists for the product or service. To apply for funding support students must be in full time attendance on one of DkIT’s under-graduate or post graduate courses. The Regional Development Centre in DkIT will administer the fund and significant interest is anticipated.

The Dundalk Credit Union Student Innovation Fund will open in September 2009 and applica-tions forms are available from Garrett Duffy (garrett.duffy@dkit.ie )

DkIT team make it to “Dare to be Digital” DkIT's Computer Games Development students have just completed a notable double. The fantastic achievement from last year in being selected to compete in Dare to be Digital has just been repeated!

Dare to be Digital is run by Abertay University in the UK. Dare to be Digital is a video games development competition for extremely talented students who are studying at a university or college. Dare to be Digital is internationally regarded by both industry and the higher education sector as being a premiere games design/development competition.

This year, fourteen teams from the UK, Ireland, Canada, Norway, India and China have been selected to spend the summer months developing their computer game ideas. Among these fourteen international teams in one that consists of third and fourth year DkIT Computer Games Development students. The team, who call themselves Bubblegum Games, are Andrew White-brook, Lisa Tumbleton, Natasha O' Hare, Eamonn Reilly and Shane Moriarty.

The five DkIT students will spend ten weeks during the summer in Abertay University, Scotland. While in Abertay, the students will get the opportunity to bring their game to completion. The team will receive expert mentoring from various games industry gurus. At the end of the ten weeks, all fourteen teams will get the opportunity to demonstrate their games during the Edinburgh Interactive Festival. Hopefully DkIT's team can go on to win the Dare to be Digital final in August!

Bubblegum Games’ game is called Radiant Jade. The game is an isometric, arcade-style action game in which the main character, Jade, crash lands on an alien planet and must defend herself from waves of enemies while finding a way to repair her ship to escape.

Congratulations to Chen Miao a second year internet technologies student who celebrated his 21st birthday during Easter.

An Taoiseach An Taoiseach

Brian Cowen Brian Cowen

visits DkITvisits DkIT

FOUR 6th year students from Dundalk's De La Salle College took the first place prize in Dundalk Institute of Technology's inaugural GamesForAll@DkIT competition. The winning team consisted of Darren Flynn, Ryan Watters, Peter Duffy and Aidan Moran. The four Leaving Certificate students won a cash prize of €500 for themselves and a further €500 for their school.

The winning game is called E-Arcade. EArcade is a 3D interactive virtual arcade game. Arcade is unique in that it is geared toward console gamers. The main platform for the game is on the XBox 360. The main aim of E-Arcade is to provide a friendly and amusing social networking experience. The game consists of one big game level, called "The Arcade". E-Arcade makes social networking more interactive and a lot more enjoyable by offering a large variety of activities to do.

The Arcade is populated by various items, such as arcade machines that players can play mini-arcade gameson. The Arcade also has a bowling alley and a shooting range. Within the game, there is a games store where players can purchase mini-games and download demos.

Second Place in the GamesForAll@DkIT competition went to Kieran Hoey, Mateusz Mrowca Kuscorz and Ciaran McCormack from Ardee Community School. The three Ardee students call themselves the Uber Leets. In their game, players get to choose an avatar that can be assigned a gender, hair style, hair colour and skin colour. Players can communicate with other players via chat or keyboard. Players can view other players' profiles by clicking on their avatar.

De La Salle College achieved a notable double by also scooping third place in the competition. Daire Cashman and Dylan Grehan. The two De La Salle students designed a game called Super City. The game is based on a fictional municipality that is populated by super heroes. Players choose their own super hero avatar and can fit their super hero out with costume, powers and appearance. The powers that are available to the super heroes are fire, water, electricity, strength and speed. Players can communicate with each other and work together to combat crime in their virtual city.

The GamesForAll @DkIT competition aims to raise awareness of the fact that games design and games development offer very real opportunities in an industry that combines art, computing and a whole lot of imagination! You don’t need to have a computer or a games background to enter this competition. The judges were looking for ideas for new games that enrich life, that are fun and that make people interact with each other.

Not sure what your options are?

Find out at the Grad Ireland Summer Fair 2009: the place for graduate opportunities.

Wednesday, 10 June 2009

11.00 am - 5.00 pm.

Serpentine Hall,.

RDS,.

Dublin 4.

Not just a jobs fair!

In these uncertain times, this event will give you an insight into all your options. Meet organisations face to face to ask those burning questions, learn essential skills through a wide series of seminars and talks, and pick up free careers guides to help you plan your future.

Make sure you visit all five zones:

Graduate careers

Postgraduate study

Upskilling

Entrepreneurship

Work/volunteer overseas

Learn from the experts

Over 20 talks and seminars will take place to help you decide your next step. From how to write the perfect CV to finding out how to get a job in New Zealand.

A Great Night for an Even Better CauseA Great Night for an Even Better Cause

Benefit Gig For African Development ProgrammeBenefit Gig For African Development Programme

This June and July two DkIT graduates, Claire Mackin and Margaret Clarke, will be travelling to Tanzania in Eastern Africa with the Development Perspectives programme to take part in a month long project in the area.

Development Perspectives is an independent Irish based NGO. They have been active for the last four years raising awareness of and tackling complex issues such as poverty, conflict, climate change, inequality and much, much more.

The programme emphasises development education and explores why the world we live in is becoming ever more interdependent and unequal. Margaret and Claire have been attending workshops over the past few weeks to study development theory and the trip to Tanzania will give them the op-portunity to put it into practice.

In order to raise funds for the project they have organized a benefit night in Jackie Murphys, on the Dublin Road, on the 12

th

of June with music from the best of our local music scene including; The Gakk, The Tramps, Podracer, Thrillcapsule and The New Originals. A great night is guaranteed. Tickets are €10 and can are available through Jackie Murphys or by calling Claire on 086 3085208 or Margaret on 086 3042065.

Early Perspectives Early Perspectives Pat MalonePat Malone

In this final part, Pat recalls the various “moves” of the Motor section and the setting up of the plumbing section and then … over to Pat …

We’re on the move once more

Suddenly after all our hard work in our initial move to the college, we were on the move again. A new extension was built on the south wing in the early eighties to accommodate Carpentry and Joinery, Motor Engineering on the ground floor and business studies upstairs. Everything was lifted, hauled and installed in this very large area that was complete with offices, classrooms, workshops and three garages.

Now coming into the mid eighties, the apprentice numbers were beginning to drop. It was a time of great concern as we were well staffed up. Suddenly the RTC was asked to take on CIE block release apprentices. Great, until we were told that they were bus building apprentices. What do we know about bus building I said to the CEO? You will learn Pat, you will learn. There was a City and Guilds syllabus for the course and final exam. The work was spread out amongst the Motor staff, Science, Carpentry & Joinery and Maths areas. Gerry Weldon occupied a workshop and his class made two purpose built trailers for the college ground staff. Tommy Harrison got them to make up moulds to cast aluminium wheels and made up a small steam traction engine that they steamed up and ran it on the floor. Leo McSherry took materials and Michael Mullin took Maths. Carpentry & Joinery took them for mobile furniture and I did the body building theory.

This class of 12 came from a spread down the west coast from Donegal to Cork and Waterford. These were bright fellows, hand picked by CIE. In the end their City & Guilds exam results were fantastic. A local car trader, Tom Murphy R.I.P. left three car bodies in with us. Strange enough, Tom’s family originally owned the land that the college was built on. The car bodies were belted in various places with hammers and the dints were removed and finished. This created a terrible racket and did not go down well with the business studies classes upstairs. A lot more could be written about those times but I must move on.

The four section heads were in charge of the four apprentice areas; Fitting, Electrical, Carpentry & Joinery and Motor. Changes were constantly taking place and with one thing and another I was talked into taking charge of the Fitting Section in addition to my own Motor Section. On reflection there was no way that these apprentices could be allowed to go adrift. As time moved on and ap-prentice numbers dropped further, the fitting apprentice groups were withdrawn from the College. The engineering industry suffered badly in Dundalk. It is quite possible that fitting classes were running in Dundalk before any other trade. This was due mainly to the Great Northern Railway works having been located here employing hundreds of men of all engineering trades. John Mi-nogue R.I.P. taught fitters while still working with the G.N.R.

And We’re on the Move Again

Now in the mid 1990s and guess what – we were been moved out again. Yes back to where I stood on 1

st Sept 1970 and where “thorn-in-the-foot” very nearly killed himself. Some of the Motor

equipment was now out of date and surplus to requirements for our new syllabus. The motor sec-tion was changing over to a ten-week block system. The method of examining was also chang-ing. Up to date equipment was purchased which was more in keeping with the test centres. The area that we were now moving back into was too small to accommodate the now larger classes of 16 apprentices but life went on.

Time to wind down to the big day

I was now within two years of retirement and two new members were added to the Motor Staff to accommodate the new system. They were both full of youthful enthusiasm, namely Michael Crosby and the other, Anthony Hoey had represented Ireland in the International Skill Olympics in Taiwan in 1993 and now took over my position as competition examiner at National level. The building industry was booming, at the turn of the century and like in all the building trades there was huge demand for plumbers. DKIT were requested by the Dept of Education and Science to set up a course for plumbing apprentices. This was not like a class that could be operated in a classroom. This would be a massive project requiring huge workshop space and specialised staff, not to mention a huge budget. John Connolly, Head of School of Engineering asked if I would take it on, or was it that he told me? I could do without this now John I said. I had to go away and give it some thought. My knowledge of plumbing would be limited but I wouldn’t have to teach on the course. Eventually and for my own reasons I decided to take it on. It would be a great challenge as if I needed one and the budget would surely be very generous. I was back with two sections again.

The story of the entire set-up would be too involved to relate. I studied the syllabus, workshop layout and equipment requirements. I travelled to DIT on a number of occasions to observe their workshop set up and class operation. Brendan Carthy, the Institute Building Engineer was as-signed to the project and things started to happen. Brendan and myself travelled out to a number of plumbing centres including Cork and we were learning all the time. Initially it was planned to set up in the Blackthorn Shoe factory but then Carroll’s Factory became available. Setting up a plumbing workshop at Carroll’s would be a massive and time consuming operation, so temporary workshop space would have to be found.

The Electrical Section Head, Gerry Woods ran his practical classes next door to the motor sec-tion. Somebody must have talked nicely to him because he moved his section upstairs. Gerry had come up with some workshop mechanisms that enabled him to operate his practicals on a greatly reduced floor space. By this time our first plumbing expert Simon O’Neill had arrived. Simon was a time served Plumber and had a diploma in building construction and was great with CAD. That made a team of three and John Connolly was the fourth and he held the purse strings. Not too tightly might I add. The now vacated Electrical section was modified to take the plumbers. The motor technician Michael Caraher, Electrical Technician Keith Sansom R.I.P. and our newly appointed plumbing technician Alan Gorham combined to bring about a surprisingly smooth change over. By this time a second plumbing teacher Frank Maguire was appointed. Fitting out of the workshop for plumbers now commenced. A top of the range extract system and all other re-quirements were installed. It was wonderful to see the classes in operation at long last.

Work started straight away to prepare a permanent plumbing area in Carroll’s Factory. It was a massive floor space and would want to be, as it had to accommodate two large workshops, a store and a technician’s lab. Staff offices, a classroom and drawing office were also accommo-dated in this space. It is most certainly the finest plumbing centre in Ireland. Another move. With our new plumbing centre at Carroll’s now ready for occupation in Sept 2002 the temporary centre was now dismantled. Confusing isn’t it! Now came the chance that I had been waiting for. The workshop next door to the Motor section was now vacant. Now was the chance to make a practi-cal size garage. Permission granted. The outline plans were drawn up with the approval of the entire motor staff and Brendan Carthy took it from there. What a wonderful conclusion – two sec-tions up and running. On the 20

th June 2002 I placed a sign on my office chair “Office space to let

– vacant possession.” I crossed the car park, completely fulfilled and extremely thankful for the conception, birth and upbringing of the RTC/DKIT.

Caption Competition. And this weeks.... Send your captions to editor@dkit.ie

Ronan, keep your hands

where I can see them.

You can take the boy out of Munster

Congratulations to Stuart Quinn