The National University of Ireland, 1908-2008
Centenary Essays

List of Illustrations
Foreword
- The Chancellor, Dr Garret FitzGerald
Acknowledgements
Contributors to this Volume
Abbreviations
EARLY HISTORY
- From Royal University to National University, 1879-1908, John Coolahan
Achieving Equality
- Women and the Foundation of the University, Senia Paseta
The Position of the Irish Language, Gearoid O Tuathaigh
CONSTITUENT COLLEGES TO CONSTITUENT UNIVERSITIES
- University College Cork, John A. Murphy
National University of Ireland, Galway, Seamus Mac Mathuna
University College Dublin, Donal McCartney
National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Seamus Smyth
THE CHANCELLORS
- William J. Walsh, 1908-21, Daire Keogh
Eamon de Valera, 1921-75, John Walsh
T. K. Whitaker, 1976-96, Ronan Fanning
Garret FitzGerald, 1997-, Maurice Manning
THE FUNCTIONING OF THE NUI
- The Senate and the Changing Role of the Registrar, Attracta Halpin
The Recognised Colleges, John Nolan
The Role of Convocation, Linda O'Shea Farren
The Archives held in the National University of Ireland, Noirin Moynihan. THE CHALLENGE OF CHANGE
- The National University of Ireland and the Changing Structure of Irish Higher Education, 1967-2007, John Coolahan
Coming to terms with the 1997 Act
- The National University of Ireland Senate, 1997-2007, Tom Dunne
APPENDICES
- I NUI, 49 Merrion Square
II Chancellors
III Vice-Chancellors
IV Pro-Vice Chancellors
V Registrars
VI Members of Senate
VII Timeline of NUI Appointments
VIII NUI Awards and Scholarships
Index.

"Few enterprises in the history of the 20th-century Ireland had such fair winds at their backs as the establishment of the National University of Ireland by the 1908 Irish Universities Act. A handsome centenary volume puts into context and recounts the history of the NUI. Dr Garret FitzGerald, its current chancellor, says it is 'closely linked with and to an extent mirrors the evolution of the State in the 20th century' … The range of subjects in this lavishly-illustrated book offers an overview of the NUI’s functions and responsibilities … For over a century, the NUI put before its colleges the primary goals of its founding mission, the importance of undergraduate teaching, the promotion of scholarship and research and the role of a national university in identity formation … Implicit in some of the essays and the profiles of four of its chancellors – Daire Keogh on archbishop William Walsh, the first chancellor; John Walsh on Eamon de Valera, the longest serving; Ronan Fanning on T. K. Whitaker, an experienced negotiator and Maurice Manning on Garret FitzGerald, passionate believer in the NUI ideal – is the conviction that the NUI has been a keystone in the formation of a national identity … For more than 100 years, men and women of great intellect and wisdom have applied themselves to the enterprise of establishing a university system that shaped and reflected back to Irish society its academic values. Will the NUI survive? This is a book that broadens our understanding of the connections between culture, economics and identity as we face the challenges of a new century."

Margaret MacCurtain
Irish Times
30 October 2008

"The National University of Ireland, with its constituent colleges of Dublin, Galway, Cork and latterly Maynooth, is the biggest such institution in Ireland and numbers its graduates in thousands, including the great and the good. … This book traces its origins in the old Royal University … and its transformation into the National University, mainly for political reasons, in 1908. … This handsome book is copiously illustrated with photographs of noteworthy individuals associated with the NUI as well as paintings from the Merrion Square premises."

Books Ireland
Nov 08

"The creation of the National University of Ireland in 1908 brought a long struggle for what was then called 'university education for Catholics' to an end. The new body combined the old Queen’s Colleges, the Royal University and the remains of Newman’s University College. … The colleges of the NUI, as they existed until the 1970s, provided essentially the professional qualifications for the children of the middle classes. Their staffs were a very mixed, with some men of energy, enterprise and vision. Eoin MacNeill and Alfred O’Rahilly, in their very different ways, are examples. But the familiar universities of today, which have grown up since then, have followed neither the English nor the European, but the American model. They have become part of an international world of learning in a way that was not the case in earlier decades. What an astonishing transformation it has been, empowering the creation of our modern state. … This book is a series of essays recording these stages to mark the centenary of the NUI. It is filled with interest, a model of modern book making, lavish with colour illustrations and actual cloth binding, in its own self an image of the new learning in Ireland."

The Irish Catholic
December 4, 2008