Magee campus at the Ulster University in Derry
McLaughlin was responding to a report from the Royal Irish Academy’s Higher Education Futures Taskforce, which called for Ireland’s Shared Island Unit, Peace Plus and other institutions to come together to jointly plan enhanced third level education provision on a cross-border basis in the North West of Ireland.
The report also called for greater cross-border engagement in teaching, learning and research.
The report made telling observations about the provision of third level education in and around Derry.
It noted: “Irrespective of how it is defined, there is general acceptance that the north-west region of Ireland has been disadvantaged in both jurisdictions due to inevitable limitations imposed by a land border and its peripherality from the major centres of political and economic power and focus, namely Belfast and Dublin…..
“In Northern Ireland the long-standing dispute over the siting of the New University of Ulster in Coleraine rather than Derry has tended to obscure the fact that HE (higher education) investment has been concentrated in Belfast, with over 80% of all HE places and associated infrastructural capital spending based there.”
Said the Foyle MLA: “I welcome this call for an external review of university provision in Derry and the North West.
“As these outside experts have concluded, we need to increase the number of university and other higher education places in order that our city and region benefit from improved skills, job creation and economic expansion.
“The report refers to the role of UK’s levelling-up fund, as well as Ireland’s Shared Island Unit.
“Derry has particular problems in terms of unemployment and low pay, which deserve attention from both these financial sources.”
