A new approach in the field of child and youth research, which involves working positively with teenagers, rather than focussing on negative connotations, will be discussed during a public lecture at NUI Galway on Wednesday, 23 March. According to Professor Richard Lerner, guest speaker at the event, we should reject the prevailing negative view of adolescents, which focuses on what they lack. Professor Lerner, who is Bergstrom Chair and Director of the Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development at Tufts University in the US, claims most young people enjoy an affirmative experience of adolescence, are engaged positively with like minded peers, and supported in caring families with parents who they respect and love. With this in mind, he believes we need to change ways of thinking about adolescence and shift practice with them and our research about them to a strengths-based and assets-based approach. Challenging years of negative stereotyping of youth in the media and deficit thinking on young people in academic research, Professor Lerner has created an enormous body of research over the last four decades. His recent book, The Good Teen, offers a programme of Positive Youth Development. According to Dr Caroline Heary of the School of Psychology at NUI Galway: "Professor Lerner has really taken a fresh look at teenagers and takes a positive approach, rather than trying to 'fix' negative behaviour. In his book The Good Teen, he says positive outcomes can be had when the strengths of young people are aligned with resources for healthy development, such as families, schools and communities. He also puts great emphasis on the importance of sustained positive adult-youth relations, skill building activities, youth partnership and youth leadership." The lecture is sponsored by the PhD in Child and Youth Research which is a collaboration between NUI Galway and TCD, and is supported by the Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs.  All are welcome to the event which takes place in Room MY243, Áras Moyola, NUI Galway at 6pm on Wednesday, 23 March. -Ends-

The Centre for Innovation and Structural Change (CISC) and Management Discipline, NUI Galway, recently led a leadership capability study, funded by the IRCHSS, at senior management level in the Irish Civil Service. The study, led by Dr Alma McCarthy, was carried out between May and August 2010. Over 140 senior managers participated in the study from 12 Government Departments and the Office of the Revenue Commissioners with over 1,200 leadership surveys completed in total. The research report from this study will be launched and the findings showcased at a Public Service Leadership Conference, hosted by NUI Galway on Friday, 8 April 2011. This report will represent the most extensive study of its kind to-date in Ireland. Keynote speakers will include Dr Maria Maguire, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and Independent Consultant, who will provide insights from international best practice in the area having worked on leadership, human resource management, and human resource development projects in a range of public sector organisations across the world over the past ten years; Philip Kelly, Assistant Secretary General, Department of An Taoiseach with responsibility for Transforming Public Services will give a presentation on Strengthening Leadership in the Irish Public Service; and Brian Cawley, Director General of the Institute of Public Administration will review leadership development policy to date and present a framework for effective public sector human resource development. At the conference, Dr Alma McCarthy, CISC and J.E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics, NUI Galway will present the findings of the 2010 NUI Galway senior management leadership capability study. Speaking about the upcoming conference, Dr Alma McCarthy, said: "This conference will focus specifically on the area of senior management leadership capability in the Irish public service. The conference will debate the important areas of human resource management, talent management, and leadership development that merit attention in the drive for public service modernisation and reform. The conference is extremely timely given the new Government's express focus on reform and the establishment of the new Public Expenditure and Reform Department under Minister Brendan Howlin." The conference is open to the public and will be of particular interest to senior management in the public and civil service, practitioners, consultants and professionals working in the human resource management, human resource development, and leadership development fields as well as those with an interest in public service modernisation and new public management. For further information, or to register, visit www.conference.ie. Please note that registration closes on Friday, 1 April. -Ends-

The NUI Galway Centre for Irish Studies will host a free public lecture on Tuesday, 29 March, in the Joseph Larmor Lecture Theatre, NUI Galway at 8pm. The lecture, 'Hanna and Her Sisters: The lives of Hanna Sheehy Skeffington and Margaret Sheehy Culhane Casey, as told by their granddaughters', will be a joint presentation delivered by NUI Galway Lecturer, Dr Micheline Sheehy Skeffington, and Professor Dara Culhane, Simon Fraser University, Canada. While studying in the then Royal University in Dublin, Hanna became very aware of the lack of power given to women, specifically in relation to the vote. Joining various campaigns for votes for women, she finally co-founded the Irish Women's Franchise League with Margaret Cousins in 1908. She was imprisoned for suffrage activities and then, when her husband, Francis Sheehy Skeffington, was murdered in 1916, she was elected to tour the US to expose the truth behind this and campaign for Irish freedom. She returned in 1918 to serve on the Sinn Féin Executive. In the first presentation, Dr Sheehy Skeffington will give an account on aspects of Hanna Sheehy Skeffington's life, using archive photos and material housed in the National Library, Dublin. The second presentation, by Professor Culhane, is based on a reading of Margaret Sheehy Culhane Casey's letters to her sister, Hanna. An actress and elocutionist, Margaret lived in Montreal, Canada from 1922 to1939. Her letters home offer insights into Margaret herself, her life in Ireland and in Canada, and into the relationship between these two sisters. Speaking about the upcoming lecture, Mary Clancy of NUI Galway noted, "The personal and political lives of Hanna and Margaret Sheehy show in fascinating detail how early twentieth century Ireland tried to construct itself, in public and in private, as it strived to determine and to define a democratic and progressive national state." -ends-

The Centre for Innovation and Structural Change (CISC) at NUI Galway will host the 3rd Annual Social Marketing Conference. Entitled 'Enabling Sustainable Behaviour: The Environment, Communities, Health & Well Being', the Conference will take place on Friday, 15 April at NUI Galway. Social marketing is the application of marketing concepts and techniques to achieve specific behavioural goals for a social good. Social marketing as already had considerable success in tackling issues such as water conservation, waste reduction, obesity, smoking, cancer screening, recycling and road safety in countries including the USA, Canada, Britain, France, New Zealand and Australia. The 3rd Annual Social Marketing Conference will bring together two world renowned sustainable behavioural change experts, Dr Doug McKenzie-Mohr and Dr Craig Lefebvre. For over two decades Dr McKenzie-Mohr, President, McKenzie-Mohr & Associates, has been working to incorporate scientific knowledge on behaviour change into the design and delivery of environmental programmes. He is the founder of Community-Based Social Marketing, has delivered workshops internationally for over 50,000 environmental programme managers and his best-selling book, 'Fostering Sustainable Behaviour: An Introduction to Community-Based Social Marketing' has become requisite reading for those who deliver environmental programmes. Dr McKenzie-Mohr is also the founder of the Fostering Sustainable Behaviour website, journal and listserv and is a former Professor of Psychology at St Thomas University, Canada. Dr Craig Lefebvre is an architect and designer of public health and social change programmes and is an internationally recognised expert in social marketing. Dr Lefebvre s work on several hundred social marketing projects has addressed a multitude of health risks for a broad array of audiences in global, national, state and community contexts. He is chief maven of SocialShifting, a social design, marketing and media consultancy and holds faculty appointments in the George Washington University, University of Maryland and University of South Florida College of Public Health. His current work focuses on integrating design thinking, social media and mobile technologies into social marketing and organisational change programmes. He has also been coordinating a global effort to establish a digital platform and professional association for social marketers. Dr Lefebvre also produces and writes the blog 'On Social Marketing and Social Change' available at socialmarketing.blogs.com. Other practitioners and leaders in the public and voluntary sector will also be on hand to answer questions. Speaking about the upcoming Conference, Dr Christine Domegan, Conference Organiser and Senior Lecturer in Marketing at the School of Business and Economics, NUI Galway, said: "For those concerned with community based initiatives and environmental issues, the Conference brings two renowned world experts to Galway for a unique, comprehensive introduction to Sustainable Community-Based Social Marketing. The Conference will enable participants to consider the scope for using marketing principles and techniques to effect environmental change and fundamentally alter the way we live for the better. It will demonstrate how professionals, seeking to bring about behavioural and social change, can apply it to practical situations in Ireland." For more information or to register online, visit the conference website at www.conference.ie. An Early Bird fee will apply to those who register before Friday, 25 March. -Ends-

Information and Communication Technology The Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector is one of the most important export-oriented economic sectors in Ireland, with great opportunities for economic development and contributing to the recovery. Innovations made in Ireland, based on research, are creating these opportunities. The Annual All-Ireland ICT Dissertation Award of the Royal Irish Academy aims to make more visible the significant scientific contribution made by Ireland, in particular by post-graduate students, to Information and Communication Technology. This award also aims at initiating knowledge transfer from the Universities and Institutes of Technology into society and the economy. As some of the largest research efforts in ICT in Ireland, this thesis award is organised and sponsored by the Science Foundation Ireland funded Centres for Science, Engineering and Technology (CSETs) in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector (DERI, CLARITY, CTVR, CNGL, and LERO) under the auspices of the Royal Irish Academy. The award is combined with a cash prize of €1500, sponsored by the CSETs. The President of the Royal Irish Academy, Professor Luke Drury, said: "This award reflects the importance of ICT research as an integral part of the academic landscape in Ireland. Digital tools and electronic communications are now indispensable in all areas of research as well as more generally in civic society and commerce. Excellence in this area in our Universities and Institutes of Technology is a necessary prerequisite for economic growth and prosperity." The Director of ICT Research in Science Foundation Ireland, Professor Fionn Murtagh, said: "Our ever-changing ICT industry will play a pivotal role in Ireland s economic recovery. With a large number of ICT multinational companies based in Ireland collaborating with ICT-focused research bodies, it is crucially important that we continue to position Ireland at the leading edge of technological innovation. Science Foundation Ireland has been instrumental in facilitating this, and is committed to continuing such a role in partnership with a diverse range of agency, commercial and academic partners." Chairperson of the evaluation committee and Director of DERI, NUI Galway, Professor Stefan Decker said: "ICT has a critical economic role in Ireland. Thanks to the foresight of Science Foundation Ireland, Irish ICT research is internationally competitive, with many areas in a world-leading position. This award is showing the ingenuity of Irish based ICT research to the public. " The closing date for submissions is Saturday, 7 May, 2011. The winner will be announced in June, 2011. For more details about the award please go to :http://ria.ie/our-work/grants---awards/national-prizes-awards.aspx -Ends-