External Landscape
For Irish higher education institutions, the period 2011 to 2014 was dominated by an intensive and transformative process of landscape reconfiguration which was driven by the HEA and overseen by the Minister for Education & Skills. This was a challenging time for MIC.
In the wake of the economic crisis of 2008, the Government was advised that rationalisation of the teacher education sector of higher education should take place. When options for reconfiguration of the higher education landscape were considered, it was recommended to the Minister that the two biggest teacher education institutions in the country, St. Patrick's College Drumcondra and MIC, should merge into Dublin City University (DCU) and UL, respectively.
St. Patrick's College and DCU agreed together to follow this recommendation. MIC adopted a different position based on the importance of the denominational ethos to the identity of the institution as well as a conviction that its strategic interest was best served by continuing to preserve its independence and autonomy. Although this proved to be a controversial decision and ran counter to the recommendation of the HEA, which was accepted by the Minister, the College prevailed in its determination to safeguard its autonomy. A strategy based on a belief that MIC possessed all hallmark traits of a university-level institution followed, with the College striving to emphasise and assert these dimensions of its profile both, within the higher education milieu, and within the broader realm where it embarked on a concerted effort to build new partnerships with the public and private sectors, as well as prestigious international higher education institutions active in the same academic space (including Teachers College, Columbia University, the University of Notre Dame, and Boston College).
The College flourished in the years that followed, doubling its numbers and eventually breaching the significant 5,000-student mark, becoming a multi-campus institution and diversifying its portfolio of offerings by incorporating the post-primary teacher education provision at the former St. Patrick's College in Thurles, Co. Tipperary, and driving forward with a fruitful graduate education strategy that resulted in an exceptional rate of growth in doctoral studies across the Faculties.
