Back in June I took part in a workshop in preparation for taking part in the ICT Champions scheme. This is a joint effort by many organisations involved in electronics, science and computing in Ireland to get schoolkids interested in these areas. The idea is to visit local schools, tell them what you do and what your career has been and show them (via things like iPods) how engineering and technology are part of every aspect of their lives.

Many of the stats presented at the workshop regarding technical courses at both second level and third level were shocking and I cannot believe that there are not more educators involved in this as a matter of urgency. The shortfall in technical graduates coming through the education system over the next few years is huge. We will have thousands of job opportunities simply disappear since we will have no-one to fill those positions.

I was disgusted to see that of all the schools in Bandon who were contacted about the scheme, not one girl’s school signed up! I found the anti-maths, anti-non-life-sciences bias in girl’s schools ridiculous when I was leaving school twenty years ago. The fact that it is still happening today is a disgrace.

I have also discussed the general problem with people in universities and they confirm that the numbers are deeply troubling. In some engineering courses in the Institutes of Technology, there are more lecturers than students!

This is not sustainable and a concerted effort is required to make schoolkids, and more importantly, their parents, understand that eventually the property boom will end, most of the multinationals will leave and you can’t have a 100% service economy.

The Irish economy can only survive when we build a wide enough and deep enough community of indigenous companies creating the future. The people who create that future are engineers, scientists and mathematicians. Of course they work hand in hand with lawyers, accountants, financiers and others in the services business but without the ideas and the implementation capabilities of the technical community, we will grind to a halt.

Unfortunately parents only think in terms of the last downturn. So in 2001-2004, no parent would encourage their child to sign up for a technical third-level course. The fruits of that short-sightedness are to be seen since last year where we have companies countrywide screaming for technical staff and unable to find them. And don’t get me started on the number of people failing ordinary-level maths in this years Leaving Cert.

The ICT Champions Scheme is completely worthwhile and I am glad to contribute but we need a relentless message coming from every corner of business, politics and education driving home the message that a technical career is interesting, fun, challenging and a gateway to a planet of opportunities. Even the simple message of “Don’t just be part of the future, create it!” needs to be repeated at every opportunity.

If you are not already signed up or you work in a school that is not part of the scheme, I encourage you strongly to contact Deirdre de Bhailís in CEIA for Cork or Hannah Grene in IBEC nationally and add your name or your schools name to the list.

tags: ICT+Champions, ICT+Ireland, IBEC, CEIA, IEI