DCU Voices

2021 EDITION 5 our important events,” says Keogh, recalling the graduations, the award ceremonies, and poignant events held there, including the funeral service of the late Anne Louise Gilligan, the Irish theologian who taught at St Patrick’s College, and wife of Katherine Zappone. “To see the Helix transformed and at the disposal of Dublin and the State was remarkable. And it was entirely consistent with DCU’s mission, as a place-based university, a public university dedicated to the public good.” DCU also created a Covid-19 research hub. This brought together its research strengths to tackle key challenges of the crisis across areas including healthcare, technology, education, economy and society, placing its experts at the heart of the national need. Ingenuity “The Helix and what it represented was a source of immense pride for us,” says Keogh, who later wrote to the philanthropist, Chuck Feeney, who had gifted the Helix to DCU, thanking him for his performing arts space which had become an engine room of human ingenuity and a beacon of hope for the nation. “To see people posting selfies with their [vaccination] certs was fantastic, and to experience the joy of people coming out of the Helix was itself a source of hope” says Keogh. That pandemics change the course of history is a given. But how Covid-19 will reshape our society and culture, including our education system, may not be fully revealed for some time. The pivot to online learning at DCU, home to the National Institute for Digital Learning, was an overnight one. It was one that demonstrated the awesome power of technology and the resilience of staff and its 18,000 strong student body – a 50pc increase in the past five years. The pivot was all encompassing. The university developed a package of educational, emotional and practical help for students, including exam supports and a flexible accommodation system that allowed students to book by the night, if necessary. Laptops were secured and loaned and the DCU Education Trust launched an emergency fund to alleviate student hardship. DCU Alumni stepped up in their droves, too, mentoring students and guiding them through the uncertainty as their education was disrupted. Development and growth Keogh says that whatever the future holds for the “delivery” of higher education, staff and students alike are craving “human connection”. Keogh, who walks the campus daily, believes the hardest yard of Covid-19 was the sheer isolation of it all and not being able to engage in the simple, necessary act of meeting people. “We want to create a university experience where we can demonstrate what we have been saying for years. Education is not about knowledge transfer, it’s about interactions, human development, and growth.” Some surveys suggested that just a third of Irish college students felt connected to their institution last year. Keogh believes it is critical to address that acutely felt sense of disconnection experienced by many at the height of the pandemic. “The community piece is vital, what we do is not transactional, it is relational,” adding that the challenge will be to find models that work for all in the higher education sector. The obituary of the mammoth lecture has been written before. However, the digital transition and shift towards a blended approach, combining on campus teaching and e-learning, has been accelerated beyond words, and DCU lecturers have embraced quality hybrid models. But Keogh is concerned that some students and families may get left behind. The pandemic has not been felt equally and, in truth, the disadvantaged have been impacted disproportionately. Mental health is also a priority for Keogh as the higher education sector and wider society reopens. For Keogh, the pandemic has afforded DCU the opportunity to test its mission, interrogate its relevance and re-imagine its future. The future for DCU, home to students from some 55 countries, is both collaborative and international. Its strategic focus on ‘Talent, Discovery and Transformation’ will be delivered, he says, “through the filters of People First, Focus and Impact”. The University of Enterprise, renowned for its connections between industry and academia, may have shed its start-up status but it has retained its start-up entrepreneurial spirit. And, through its DCU Futures initiative, it is on the cutting edge of human capital development. People first Lauded for its access and diversity programmes and culture, DCU is the antithesis of an ivory tower and Keogh insists that regardless of what disruption awaits, its people first philosophy will not change. “The greatest hope lies in what we have,” says Keogh. “That is our people and our purpose. We have used this period to focus again on what is important to us, to empower our students to flourish in a global world. It is hugely exciting.” How an organisation performs in a crisis is the ultimate test of its claims, its mission, values and strategy. Keogh’s time at Harvard was well spent: maybe DCU’s navigation of Covid-19 will be its own case study in years to come. “Our greatest hope lies in what we have – our people and our purpose. We have used this period to focus again on what is important to us, to empower our students to flourish in a global world. It is hugely exciting.”