DELIGHT AS ELEANOR IS ONE OF DKIT’S FIRST PROFESSORS
As one of Dundalk Institute of Technology’s first professors, Prof. Eleanor Jennings has every right to be pleased . She was among the first group of staff to be honoured by DkIT this year for her work in heading up the Institute’s Centre for Freshwater and Environmental Studies. Her achievement is all the more remarkable considering she left school at 16, but her love of science led to her returning to education as a mature student and becoming a leader in her field.
‘I always had an interest in science,’ says the Clontarf native who is now based in Dundalk. This she inherited from her father who was the first agricultural scientist to work for RTE. He worked on the farming programme ‘On The Land’ and was also an agricultural advisor for Ireland’s first soap ‘ The Riordans’.
Eleanor shared his way of looking at things and questioning them, but having three children at an early age meant she had little time for studies.
Sadly her first two children were born with cystic fibrosis and after the death of her son at an early age, she decided, with the support of her family, to return to education.
‘I went to Colaiste Dulaigh, Coolock, to sit my Leaving Cert so that I could go to Trinity College.’
‘I had two young children, aged eight and twelve, when I started in Trinity as a mature student,’ she recalls. ‘As a mature student you have a very different attitude than the younger students, who want to experience the whole social side of college as well, when you have to go home and help with homework or go to parent teacher meetings.’
That said, she enjoyed her time at college and graduated with first class honours in Botany from TCD, and was awarded the Junior Edge prize in Botany, before going on to do a PhD in Trinity. She worked as a Research Fellow, working on a range of national and European projects in the TCD Centre for the Environment, all of which focused on climate impacts on freshwater systems.
In 2008, she was offered the opportunity to take up a position at DkIT as lecturer at the Department of Applied Sciences. She took over as Director of the Centre for Freshwater and Environmental Studies six years ago.
‘My area of research is looking at climate change and climate effects,’ she says. ‘We are in an environmental crisis at the moment.’
She hopes that the research being carried out in the Centre will raise awareness about what needs to be done to halt the damage being caused by the pressures on our environment, as well as informing policy at national and international level.
During her time as director, Eleanor has been successful in getting €6.5million from national and international funding for projects and the Centre has grown, to having eight principal investigators, three postdoctoral staff, two research assistants, as well 14 postgraduate students and a research technician. It works closely with other research institutes in Ireland and Europe.
One project, The MANTEL programme, is training 12 PhD students from across Europe to investigate the effect of climate extremes on lakes and reservoirs. Another project have has looked at last year’s heatwave and carried out computer modelling to see if this is likely to become the new norm.
Closer to home, research students in the centre have looked at the effect of cattle access to streams and rivers on water supplies, while another study is investigating the presence of micro plastics in sea life in Dundalk Bay.
‘If you go back five or ten years ago, people weren’t conscious of these issues, but now environmental issues are very much part of the news.
‘We can’t separate environmental issues from our everyday lives because we are part of the environment. It’s the environment that surrounds us, it’s what we live in.’
She welcomes the new voices like Greta Thurnberg and Extinction Rebellion who speaking out about the crisis facing the planet due to climate change and putting it firmly on the political agenda.
Young people, she notes, are much more concerned about the issue. ‘It’s good to see them awakening and protesting again.’
Many students for example are becoming vegetarian and vegan as they look for ways in which they can make a difference in their own lives.
‘It’s fantastic to see these strong voices from the people who are going to inherit the world after us.’
She admits that the challenge of making a change can be very daunting for people, especially when everything seems stacked against them.
‘I tried to do without plastic for a week and it was really difficult,’ she says. ‘I tried not to buy anything with plastic and collected all the plastic which I bought into a box - it was a shock to see how much it was.’
However, she says it’s up to consumers to speak out and tell retailers that they
I’D SAY TO PEOPLE, ALWAYS FOLLOW YOUR DREAM AND DON’T GIVE UP. MORE AND MORE ARE GOING BACK TO EDUCATION LATER IN LIFE
don’t want all this excessive packaging. ‘As customers we have a huge influence when we make our voices heard.’
Getting the message across to young people is important, she says, as they then bring it home to their parents.
It’s for this reason, that she is enthusiastic about outreach programmes run by DkIT’s science departments and the centre, such as the programme of events taking place for Science Week.
These include the Cell Explorers and H2O Heroes projects for schools which introduce young children to science.
Eleanor believes that DkIT is a huge asset for Dundalk. ‘It gives local people the opportunity to go to college here, do a degree and then a Masters or a PhD. It is wonderful that they have all that on their doorstep.’
And, having gone to college as a mature student herself, she encourages people to do likewise.
‘I’d say to people, always follow your dream and don’t give up,’ she says, ‘ More and more people are going back to education later in life, which is one reason why it’s
so important to have a third level college in a town like Dundalk.’
‘We do have a considerable number of mature and older students who are very committed to their work. It’s also a win win for employers when these students graduate as they are getting people who have come back with a determination to succeed. When you come back to education, you have made changes in your life, you might have given up work for example, so you are going to make sure you make a success of it.’
Third level institutions, she notes, are very supportive of people going back into education and are aware of the extra challenges they might face, such as having a young family at home.
She was delighted that her own success in going back to education as a mature student and becoming a successful researcher and scientist was acknowledged when she was named as one of DkIT’s first six professors.
‘It’s nice to be acknowledged and that the work you have done is appreciated,’ she says.