The Athlone man working to create a new University in the North West

While AIT is edging closer to its long-term aim of becoming a Technological University, 75 miles away in Sligo an Athlone native has been spending the last several years working to achieve the same goal for the North West region.

Dr Brendan McCormack, who grew up in Bonavalley, is now in his fifth year as President of Sligo IT. Along with GMIT and Letterkenny IT, Sligo is part of the Connacht-Ulster Alliance which hopes to become a Technological University (TU) early next year.

Speaking to the Westmeath Independent this week, Brendan pointed out that if the designation is achieved it would create the country's "first and only University north of the Dublin-Galway line" and would help reduce the number of second-level students from the region who travel elsewhere for third-level education.

"Ultimately, if I'm 'Joe Public', I want to know if this TU will allow me to get a better and more relevant qualification? And can I access it?" he said.

"There are eight counties in our catchment area of the Connacht-Ulster Alliance and at the moment over 50% of our second-level students in that catchment leave our region to study. The evidence is that a TU will stem some of that exodus."

Although he has not lived in the Midlands for many decades, Brendan retains a strong affinity for Athlone, and his wife, Mary (nee Hardiman) is also a native of the town. They met at a party while Brendan was a student of mechanical engineering in UCD. "The rest, as they say, is history!" he remarked.

"Mary is from 'the far side' - she's from Baylough. The Hardiman family are well-known in Athlone, and her brother, Eamon Hardiman, is a career guidance teacher in Our Lady's Bower. Her brother Niall lives in Beechpark, he's an electrician, and her other brother Paul is an engineer and lives in Sligo."

Brendan was one of four children born to Grainne and Donal McCormack. His father, a Wicklow native, was a first cousin of Joseph Mary Plunkett, one of the signatories of the 1916 Proclamation.

Donal became an officer in the Army and his transfer from the Curragh to Athlone resulted in the family moving there when Brendan was three years old.

They initially lived in Glenavon Terrace, near the Bower, before moving to Dun Mhuire, Bonavalley. The site where Athlone RTC was established in 1970 was not very far from the home where Brendan grew up.

"The biggest shock for us, at the time, was that there were great conker trees up at Athlone RTC, and when the college took it over in 1970 we couldn't get access to those conkers any more!" he said.

Brendan was born needing an artificial leg, which would later help foster an interest in working on medical devices.

"I was born with one 'good leg' and one short leg. My short leg was only half the length of the other leg, so I've worn an artificial leg since I was two," he explained.

"I suppose I was fortunate that I was born with it, because it was normal to me. So I'd get out and play football or handball with the lads and climb trees or run around.

"But it did give me an interest in the whole area of medical devices, and later, as an engineer, I could get into designing some of these devices."

His journey in education began in the Crescent school, near the Fairgreen, before he went on to the Marist National School.

"It was a great class. We had people like Gerry Macken of Macken's shop; David McCormack from the Post Office; Tony McCabe, whose father worked in the printing works; one of the Ryans from Ryan's shop... a great group of people from the town," he recalled.

In 1968, when Brendan was aged nine, his father died. "My mother then had to rear the four of us. We ran a B&B for many years in Bonavalley and my mother also worked in the hospital for a period of time," he said.

After attending boarding school, Brendan went to college in UCD, and from there began working in the area of bioengineering, or medical device, research.

A spell at the University of Leeds was followed by a further two years of research at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York. He came back to Ireland in 1983, moving to Greystones, where his mother had relocated by that stage.

After working as a design engineer, he was recruited by Jimmy Sheehan, one of the founders of the Blackrock Clinic.

"Back then, I was about the only person in Ireland who had a Masters' qualification in bioengineering," he said. "(Jimmy Sheehan) gave me a call and asked if I'd like to work for him, so I worked for five years doing research in various medical devices in the Blackrock clinic. Typically it was orthopaedic implants and surgical equipment."

After then lecturing for ten years in UCD, he joined Sligo IT as head of the Department of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering in 1998, going on to hold a number of other key roles at the Institute before becoming its president in 2016.

"When presidents come in from outside the sector, there's a lot of learning needed to get up to speed, but I was fortunate in that I was able to start and hit the ground running," he said.

He pointed out that the number of students enrolled in Sligo had risen from 5,500 to over 8,000 since he became president, and also spoke enthusiastically about a multi-million euro redevelopment of its campus which was granted planning permission in recent weeks.

"Amid Covid, that's a very positive story for the region. People see that money is being invested in Sligo, which is a great achievement as an Institute."

Brendan lives 10 minutes from the Sligo IT campus, and he's been continuing to go to work there every day during the current lockdown.

"There's only a handful of us here on campus, but I think it's important to have a physical presence here in case issues arise," he said.

For many years, Sligo had been providing remote or online learning courses for people who are currently in the workforce and looking to upskill, and this gave the Institute an advantage when it came to adapting to the pandemic restrictions.

Nevertheless, he acknowledged the current situation has been tough, particularly for the current group of first year students.

"A student who comes in for lectures might get chatting to somebody from Clare or from Donegal and a few months later they have a group of lads or girls who are mates, and on it goes with those friendships.

"Certainly, our first year students coming in last September didn't get any of that. They didn't get a chance to stroll down the corridor with somebody, have a cup of coffee or a chat, or see each other in the nightclub on a Friday. So that's difficult."

At the time of writing, last week, he said discussions were continuing nationally about the possible resumption of some on-campus activities, such as labs and workshops, next month.

"We've delayed all of those labs and workshops to 'later in the semester', and if we can get back on campus on March 8 we might just catch up on them.

"But if it's any later, physically there's not enough days between now and the summer to complete the semester. So that's a real challenge for us, but it's also a worry for the students.

"We're not putting a gun to anyone's head on that, but it's the reality. If we can't go back (on campus), we'll all obey it and accept it, but we're looking at every loophole that we can."

Regarding the Connacht-Ulster TU bid, he said there was a perception that it had been a bit more slow-moving than some other TU applications, but a lot of time and effort had been put into "building relationships with the social partners and the unions" and he was confident this would pay off in the long run.

He said discussions with the Teachers Union of Ireland about an agreement on staffing arrangements for the new TU were nearing completion, and the union's members would then be balloted in each of the three Institutes of Technology.

"We are there or thereabouts, and the intention, if we go through the various processes, is that we would be designated a technological university in January of next year," he said.

Brendan and Mary have two sons and a daughter. Their youngest, Don, is 29 and works for a company in London, but due to the pandemic he has been living at home and working remotely in Sligo since returning for a visit at Christmas.

Oliver, the eldest in the family, works in data analytics in San Francisco, while Deirdre is a doctor based in Dublin. Brendan's niece, Gabbi, also came to live with the family in Sligo in 1999 after her mother, Brendan's sister Gina, died in California. Gabbi is now working as a nurse in London.

Outside of work, Brendan enjoys sailing - though he hasn't had time to get out on the water as much in recent years - and he also keeps bees.

"With beekeeping you feel, to a certain extent, that you're contributing back to nature by the bees pollinating the plants.

"It's a nice hobby because, unlike with a dog, you can walk away and go on holidays and the bees will be able to look after themselves. We have a dog too, by the way!" he added.