EGA Strategy Gathers Momentum

Over the past month the EGA Board have been debating the elements of the new Strategy 2013 under 4 broad headings - Education, Membership, Finance and Marketing. Board Subcommittees were set up for the 4 areas under the Chairs of Peter Brabazon, Michael Loughnane, Tony O'Brien and Karina O'Neill respectively.

UCD EGA Strategy

Each member of the Board had a role on at least one Subcommittee. This worked quite well. I am very grateful to the entire Board for the time, energy, innovation and enthusiasm that each member brought to the reports of the Subcommittees.

An integrated Draft Strategy based on these 4 elements will be brought to the May Board Meeting for consideration and adoption. The most radical change to the EGA approach is the focus on the quality of Education in the broadest sense. This will be our primary future role to assist the UCD College of Engineering to realise its place as one of the leading Engineering Schools in Europe.

Driving this ambition is the new 5 year Masters of Engineering (ME) in Biosystems, Chemical, Civil, Electrical, Electronic and Mechanical Engineering in accordance with the Bologna European Agreement which will confirm our graduates as among the best in Europe.

To support this ambitious role a new Membership and Funding Plan will introduced on a phased basis over the next year to hopefully give us many new members backed up by a new Marketing Plan to help realise the new approach.

At the April meeting we also elected a new Board Member to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Past President Simon Kelly. We thank Simon for his active Presidency over two terms and wish him good health and success in the years ahead.

Cormac Mannion

The new Board Member is Cormac Mannion who is Energy Efficiency Manager with Energia. Cormac graduated in Mechanical Engineering in 1997 and was awarded an MEngSc in 2000. For the past 5 years he has been working with Energia with overall responsibility for their Energy Services Division. Prior to joining Energia, Cormac worked in Intel and at Littelfuse in Dundalk.

At our April meeting we also finalised arrangements for the Annual Lecture in Belfield on May 8th next at 7pm and the Annual Lunch and presentation of the 2013 Distinguished Graduate Award at the National Concert Hall on June 13th.

We also settled on 'Ceili na hInnealtoiri' as our Gathering Event in late August. We hope to attract home for a week or even a weekend the many engineers who departed our shores over the past five years or more to seek employment in UK, Australia, Canada, US and mainland Europe. We appointed a Subcommittee of Robyn Kelly, Tony O'Brien, Karina O'Neill and Chaired by Angela Treanor. They will meet shortly to select a date and venue for the Ceili event. Already the soundings from graduates I've spoken to on this totally social event are excellent. So we have a busy year ahead.