INTRODUCTION  

My qualifications and broad experience

My Name is Linda O’Shea Farren.  Having studied law in University College Cork, I qualified as a Solicitor both in Ireland and England & Wales and as an Attorney-at-Law in New York.  I also hold a 1st Class Hons. Master's Degree in Public Policy (MEconSc) from the Institute of Public Administration awarded by UCD. I am also a CEDR-accredited Mediator.  I practised law in New York and London from the mid-1980s to mid-1990s with Debevoise & Plimpton and, since returning to Ireland, I have worked in Dublin in the public, private and voluntary sectors across a broad spectrum of Law, Corporate Governance, Human Rights, Government, Education, Banking, Health and the Arts.  

My background

I have had a life-long commitment to public service.  This stems from my parents’ careers in the civil service, until the ‘marriage bar’ stopped my mother in her tracks.  Unfortunately, my father died shortly before my Leaving Cert., leaving my mother, at age 48, with seven of us.  As Limerick didn't have a university at the time, I headed off to UCC at age 17 to study law with a much-appreciated grant from Limerick City Corporation.  While local council grants enabled many people of my generation to obtain a third level education that would otherwise not have been possible (especially outside the then university cities, and especially women), we graduated into the so-called ‘brain drain’ that marked Ireland of the 1980s.  My legal journey brought me from a solicitor’s apprenticeship in West Cork to New York, to which I emigrated and qualified as an Attorney-at-Law. 

How I could represent you

I have been serving the NUI community with a graduate’s perspective and on a voluntary basis for the past 22 years. I have been elected to the NUI Senate by Convocation (NUI graduates, academics and Senate members) for the past five consecutive 5-year terms (2002 to 2027), and I served as inaugural NUI Chair of Audit & Risk for 13 years (2009-2022).  Concurrently elected to UCC’s Governing Body (2012-2015), I served as UCC’s Chair of Audit & Risk throughout that term.  I am, therefore, very familiar with the challenges that affect NUI students, graduates and academics.

My varied professional and voluntary roles within and outside a university context have placed me in an ideal position to be an active contributor and independent voice on Senate throughout my five terms. This has included a range of important issues, including serving on the Senate Sub-Committee established by Senate to oppose (successfully) dissolution of the NUI proposed by Government in January 2010, championing equality and diversity, promoting the Irish language, ensuring matriculation requirements are appropriate for today’s students, honouring Ireland’s artists and sportspeople.  

If elected as NUI Chancellor, I will use this mandate and platform to make a difference for NUI academics, graduates and students alike and I will give this job my all. 

My track record as a campaigner

Change does not happen on its own.  It takes courage to pursue change and tenacity to persevere until improvements are delivered.  I have shown initiative and tenacity in every role that I have undertaken, and I have a strong track record of getting things done.  By way of illustration, the following summary is indicative of the level of change that I have been able to achieve or influence, mostly on my own initiative and in voluntary roles:

• I was one of the first Irish lawyers to prove to the New York State Board of Law Examiners that Irish law degrees are quantitatively and qualitatively equivalent to US graduate law degrees (Juris Doctorate / JD), which set the precedent entitling Irish law graduates to sit the New York Bar Exam

• In 1985, the year in which I qualified as a solicitor and emigrated to New York, I founded the Irish American Bar Association of New York (IABANY) to meet the need of Irish immigrants in the USA for pro bono legal advice

• I applied to my law firm, Debevoise & Plimpton, to take IABANY on as a pro bono client, which enabled me to set IABANY up as a 501(c)(3) charitable organisation and put it on a permanent footing; IABANY is still thriving today, almost 40 years later, and I have been awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award for services to IABANY

• Led by me, IABANY was the only organisation to oppose an application in the late 1980s by the New York Bar Association to the New York Court of Appeals to remove New York’s recognition of  certain Common Law law degrees (including Irish) as equivalent to US Juris Doctorate degrees; we were successful in opposing this application, thereby securing Irish law graduates' eligibility to sit the New York Bar Exam to this day

• When I was practising in the London office of Debevoise & Plimpton, I was involved in the group that obtained reciprocity for Irish and English solicitors in 1991  

• In 1993, IABANY organised a large group admission of our members to the United States Supreme Court 

• When I was Programme Manager & Adviser to former Minister for Justice Nora Owen in the Rainbow Coalition in the mid-1990s, I promoted reciprocity between the State Boards of Law Examiners of states other than New York and Ireland, thereby increasing possibilities for Irish lawyers to practise in the US 

• Following my experience registering our first child born in Ireland, I successfully fought for enactment of the Registration of Births Act 1996, which equality-proofed registration of births

• Later in the 1990s, I also successfully fought a plan by Dublin Bus to replace half its fleet with inaccessible buses, and ultimately they were all made accessible 

• Having campaigned for people with disabilities throughout my adult life, I was instrumental in getting Ireland’s first disability law on the statute books in 2005

• I have also been actively involved in a campaign to save mature trees in Dublin that were slated for felling as part of Bus Connects - Irish Examiner  

• In more recent years, I have devoted much of my time to the arts in Ireland - see my CV below   

Running for NUI Chancellor

I am running for election as NUI Chancellor because I believe that a high-functioning third level education sector that is both representative of Ireland today and responsive to today’s needs of NUI students, graduates and academics is critical to Ireland’s future.  To this end, I believe that my extensive experience facing the reality of working life as a graduate and professional woman in the private sector over the past four decades would serve the NUI Chancellorship well.  

As there have only been the following five Chancellors of the NUI elected by Convocation in the university’s 116-year history to date, an NUI Chancellor election is a rare occurrence: Archbishop William J. Walsh (1908-1921); Éamon de Valera (1921-1975); Thomas Kenneth Whitaker (1976-1996); Garret FitzGerald (1997-2009); and Maurice Manning (2009-2024).  John A. Murphy, Emeritus Professor of Irish History at UCC and a former member of UCC’s Governing Body, concluded his address on the occasion of the first meeting of the Board of Governors of UCC in Co. Kerry in February 2014 - which occurred while I served on UCC’s Governing Body - as follows: 

‘And finally, at this very moment, a young Kerry woman somewhere in the Kingdom may be grooming herself for her historic role as the first female president of UCC, thus breaking the toughest glass ceiling of all - the male monopoly of leadership of Ireland’s academic institutions.’  

In light of the significant changes in Irish society since the NUI was founded in 1908, I believe that it is time for an NUI Chancellor who embodies the greater diversity of the NUI community today and represents a graduate’s perspective.  Starting in 1918, 10 years after the NUI was founded, women in Ireland (and throughout the United Kingdom) were granted the right to vote for the first time - but only at age 30 and with property or university education-related requirements, while men could vote at age 21 without these requirements.  When the Irish Free State was formed 4 years later (a little over 100 years ago now), equal voting rights were finally granted to men and women in Ireland.    

I was proposed for this role of NUI Chancellor by Professor Bryan McMahon from Kerry (former Professor of Law and Head of the Department of Law at UCC, retired High Court judge and past Chair of UCC’s Governing Body) and seconded by Tommy Francis from Donegal (former President of the Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland and past member of NUI Senate).  As I am from Limerick and have been living in Dublin for more than 30 years now, my campaign touches the four corners of Ireland.  

I hope that you can take the time to read more about me below, and about how you can cast your vote in this election.  Having been elected to the NUI Senate by Convocation for 25 years, I respectfully ask you to entrust me with your vote for NUI Chancellor.

Below, please see the following sections:   

• SOME RELEVANT ISSUES …

• Funding of NUI Universities

• Governance of NUI Universities

• Precarity of Employment for NUI Graduates and Academics

• Equality and Diversity

• Mass Emigration of NUI Graduates

• Housing & Cost of Living Crises

• Climate Change

• Paying the Artist

• ‘Town & Gown’ Engagement with the Community  

• YOUR VOTE …

• MY CV …  

SOME RELEVANT ISSUES …

I would be happy to hear about any issues or ideas you would like me to pursue if elected as NUI Chancellor, any changes you believe should be made in NUI and how you think I could represent you generally.  If you contact me by whatever means works best for you, I will be delighted to get back to you. 

In the meantime, the following are some issues in relation to which, if elected as NUI Chancellor, I will explore all possibilities and use every opportunity within the NUI’s remit to highlight - at all levels and across all fronts within the NUI and beyond - with a view to improving the situation for NUI academics, graduates and students, as relevant to each. 

Funding of NUI Universities   

Universities’ funding problems are everybody’s problem.  It is vital for the overall economic well-being of this country that we have a properly resourced third level education system that attracts the kinds of jobs to Ireland that will allow our graduates to stay here, and enable those who have emigrated to come back to live here with their families.  While reports like Cassells Expert Group’s Investing in National Ambition: A Strategy for Funding Higher Education published in March 2016 and the IUA’s Funding Irish Universities to Fuel the Knowledge Economy published in July 2018 and others since then have tackled this issue, nobody has all the answers.  The €1.5bn surplus in the National Training Fund is also noteworthy in this regard.  Ongoing pragmatic communication among all stakeholders involved is crucial to ensuring that Ireland’s third level sector not only survives but thrives. 

Governance of NUI Universities

Recent breaches of governance in some non-NUI institutions in Ireland casts a shadow across the third level community.  Governance in third level institutions needs to be best in class. I have significant qualifications and experience in corporate governance and related areas of the law, including specifically in a university context.   

Precarity of Employment for NUI Graduates and Academics   

Precarity of employment, including the so-called gig economy, is increasingly prevalent in Ireland today.  In light of the significant investment of time, energy and money that a university education in Ireland entails, this is a significant problem for university graduates, particularly in the private/commercial sector. 

However, our university campuses are also far from immune from precarity.  Not only has academic tenure long since perished, but core-funded positions and contracts of indefinite duration are increasingly beyond reach for academics. At a more granular but equally important level, casualisation of academic work, poor prospects for early career academics, ever-diminishing support and lack of career progression are very real problems for younger academics/post docs/researchers. See IFUT’s Precarious Employment in Higher Education published on 22 February 2024 and UCD’s Geary Institute for Public Policy paper on this issue and its policy implications published by Emeritus Professor Pat O’Connor on 6 June 2023.  

Employment security for people at further stages along their careers is also becoming increasingly fragile in Ireland. So many people or someone close to them have had stressful work experiences, and daily reports across the media in Ireland echo this.  For graduates, on whose professional reputation our entire careers tend to ride, this is quite a specific issue and it takes a colossal effort to fight for your employment rights - The Irish Times.   

Equality and Diversity

While strides have been made in relation to equality and diversity in recent years, this has been hard fought and there is still quite a distance to go to embed equality and diversity in Ireland. As with governance, equality and diversity in third level institutions needs to be best in class. I also have significant qualifications and experience in this area of the law.

Mass Emigration of NUI Graduates   

What is the point in trumpeting total employment and wage increases when legions of young and more experienced graduates are being forced into emigration by economic failure once again - the alternative being living in their parents’ box room, co-living, couch surfing, digital nomadism and all of the other euphemisms for not being able to afford your own living space. 

Like many of my generation, my husband, Brian Farren, and I emigrated to the United States in the 1980s because of the lack of jobs, not a lack of housing at that time.  We came home in 1993 and have raised our three children here.  Like so many other young graduates across Ireland, they are now living in the UK, continental Europe and Australia, with little hope for many graduates of ever being able to afford to come home. 

Housing & Cost of Living Crises   

While the so-called ‘brain drain’ generation was able to contribute to subsequent economic success on their return to Ireland, the ‘Celtic Tiger’ vanished following the collapse of the property bubble in 2007 and the consequent crises in the banking and construction sectors.  This has had a lasting effect on the political, economic, social and financial landscape of Ireland, leading to the current housing crisis and exorbitant cost of living that we are all experiencing throughout Ireland. 

The housing crisis is affecting the entire NUI community. It is actively affecting academics seeking promotion in third level institutions in other cities in Ireland, and preventing them from taking up job offers they receive. Many university students now have to commute long distances daily as they simply cannot find or afford accommodation anywhere near campus, and there are reports of students sleeping in their cars. Decent living conditions and ultimate home ownership used to be aspirations of a university education in Ireland, but this is fast disappearing. 

Climate Change  

Tackling climate change is the game changer of the future. This is a critical issue for the entire NUI community and beyond, and many NUI university departments have a major role to play in highlighting it. 

Paying the Artist

Many of our cities have lost cultural spaces, and supports for artists who are the lifeblood of any city are sporadic and inadequate.  If Ireland is happy to parade our artists on the international stage in aid of tourism and soft diplomacy, artists must be able to make a decent living in our cities.  This is an important issue for artists who are NUI graduates, and I have significant experience in representing artists.  

‘Town & Gown’ Engagement with Community   

Active engagement by universities with local communities is an important bridge to the campus for the general public, including opening universities’ considerable amenities to the entire community. It also attracts a diverse range of people onto campus who may be encouraged by this experience to become students in the university.  I have significant experience of delivering major arts programmes as an arts manager.  

YOUR VOTE …

• Who is eligible to vote for NUI Chancellor? 

1. Graduates of the four NUI Constituent Universities - University College Dublin (UCD), University College Cork (UCC), University of Galway (UofG/NUIG/UCG) and Maynooth University (MU/NUIM/St. Patrick’s College Maynooth) 

2. Graduates of both of NUI’s Recognised Colleges, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) and the Institute of Public Administration (IPA), during the periods specified on the following link: https://www.nui.ie/elections/docs/institutions.pdf 

3. Graduates of Colleges linked with NUI Constituent Universities, each of which college is listed on the following link together with the applicable graduation periods that are specified on this link: https://www.nui.ie/elections/docs/institutions.pdf

4. Graduates of Former NUI Recognised Colleges, each of which recognised college is listed on the following link together with the applicable graduation periods that are specified on this link: https://www.nui.ie/elections/docs/institutions.pdf

5. NUI lecturers and professors

6. Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor and members of NUI Senate

• How to request and return your voting papers - Voting papers can be requested in writing from NUI up to the deadline of Wednesday, 9th October 2024 via:

  • (i) online form https://www.nui.ie/elections/ChancellorForm/; or

  • (ii) email to elections@nui.ie; or

  • (iii) printing the application form available on NUI’s website and posting/hand-delivering it to NUI’s offices

    and providing the following information requested:

1. Your names: (i) your surname; (ii) your forename(s) in full; and (iii) any other name(s), if any, used by you (e.g., married, single, Irish language, etc.)

2. Your date of birth

3. Your postal address(es): (i) your permanent postal address; (ii) if different from your permanent address, a postal address to which you want your voting papers to be posted; and (iii) for identification purposes, any relevant previous postal address (e.g., your address when you graduated, if available)

4. Your current contact details: (i) your current telephone number; and (ii) your current email address

5. The basis on which you are claiming your vote - either 

   • if your vote is being claimed on the basis of being an NUI graduate, stating (i) your NUI Degree(s); (ii) year(s) of your conferring(s) and (iii) NUI College(s) you attended; or 

   • if your vote is being claimed on the basis of being an NUI lecturer or professor, stating the (i) institution, (ii) faculty and (iii) department in which you are a lecturer or professor 

   Receiving your voting papers - The NUI statrted posting out voting papers in early August 2024. As it might take a while for requests to be processed as more requests for voting papers are received over time, it would be great if you can request your voting papers as soon as possible. (Unlike some voting papers that arrive by registered post, voting papers for NUI Chancellor elections arrive by ordinary post, so there’s no need for someone to be at home when they arrive.)

   Returning your voting papers to NUI - I would be grateful if you could complete and return your voting papers promptly, as it is easy to forget to do this if you don’t vote promptly after receiving your voting papers. In order to ensure that your vote will be adjudicated to be valid, you will need to read and follow the instructions provided, including putting the voting paper into the inside envelope, etc.  These instructions are very straight-forward, but they must be followed if your vote is to be valid.

   Votes to arrive in NUI on or before 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, 17th October 2024 - Your envelope containing your completed voting paper and your witness form should be:

   • returned by ordinary post to the Clerk of Convocation, 49 Merrion Square, Dublin 2, to be received by NUI on or before 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, 17th October 2024, or

   • hand delivered to, or lodged in the Ballot Box located in, the Registrar’s Office, NUI, 49 Merrion Square, Dublin 2, to be received by NUI on or before 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, 17th October 2024, or

   • lodged in the Ballot Boxes located in the Registrars’ Offices in the Constituent Universities and Recognised Colleges to be received by 16:00 on Friday, 11th October 2024

• Election Meeting (as such) and Count - While the formal election meeting (as such) will take place at 11.00am on Thursday, 17th October 2024, following which all votes cast at the election meeting and all postal votes received by NUI by 11.00am on Thursday, 17th October 2024, will be counted, it is important to request your voting paper as soon as possible and to return it promptly. 

MY CV …

Education

• Educated at Presentation Convent and at Laurel Hill in Limerick

• Studied law at University College Cork, graduating with a BCL degree

• Qualified as a solicitor, after studying at Law Society of Ireland and an apprenticeship in Clonakilty, West Cork

• Qualified as a New York attorney, having sat and passed the New York Bar Exams

• Admitted to practise as a Solicitor in England and Wales

• Admitted to practise before the United States Supreme Court

• Accredited Mediator, Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR)

• Graduated with 1st Class Hons. MEconSc in Policy Analysis (and 1st in class) in November 2019 (IPA/UCD) - Master’s Thesis: Does It Pay The Composer To Put The Dots On The Page?  State fostering of  composition of contemporary classical music in Ireland: sound as a pound?

Professional Experience – Past & Present

• Worked as an Attorney-at-Law in New York and London (Debevoise & Plimpton)  [1985 to 1993]

• Founding President of the Irish American Bar Association of New York, which successfully (and on its own) fought off a New York Bar Association court challenge to recognition of Irish law degrees by New York State

• Member of American Chamber of Commerce in Europe (AmCham EU)

• Manager in Kredietbank Financial Services Ireland, negotiating finance for infrastructure projects  [1993]

• Programme Manager and Adviser to Minister for Justice Nora Owen in Rainbow Coalition 

• Director of Legal and Corporate Affairs, Irish Wheelchair Association

• Set up O’Shea Farren Solicitors, with an emphasis on advocating for, and pro bono representation of, people with disabilities and others suffering discrimination, musicians and other artists, et al. 

• Nominated by members of the Educational Building Society following the 2008 banking crisis, and elected to the Board of EBS in May 2009 

• Member of Board of the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA)

• Assessed applications to ORAC/IPO by asylum seekers for refugee status 

• Arts management in contemporary music from Ireland since 2017 

Voluntary Work – Past & Present

Examples of Leadership Roles across the Education Sector

• Member of the Senate of the National University of Ireland (NUI Senate), and former Chair of its Audit and Risk Committee  [ Elected for the past 5 x 5-year terms, from 2002 to 2027]

• Member of the Governing Body of University College Cork (UCC), and Chair of its Audit Committee  [ Elected from 2012-2015]

• Member of Mary Immaculate College Foundation, Limerick  [2012 to 2017]

• Member / Chair of a range of primary and secondary school Boards /PTAs [1998 to 2009], including Gonzaga College SJ, Ranelagh Multi-Denominational School, Scoil Bhríde, Sandford National School, St. Patrick’s Cathedral Choir School 

Examples of Leadership Roles in Disability and Equality

• Own solicitor’s practice with pro bono legal work for people with disabilities, equality, artists  [2000 to 2010]

• Pro Bono Legal Adviser to Forum of People with Disabilities

• Successfully campaigned for introduction of disability legislation in Ireland (Disability Act 2005)

• Successfully campaigned against inaccessible Dublin buses in the 1990s, all which were ultimately made accessible

• Appointed Member of European Year of People with Disabilities (EYPD 2003), Sub-Committee on Rights and Responsibilities

• Addressed United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in Geneva re: Irish government’s record on rights for people with disabilities

• Successfully campaigned for equality in registration of births (Registration of Births Act 1996)

Examples of Leadership Roles in Music & the Arts

• Chairperson of the Board of Dublin International Chamber Music Festival (formerly Great Music in Irish Houses)  [2009 to date; Chair since 2019]

• Board Member of The Galway Music Residency  [2018 to date]

• Board Member of Dance Cork Firkin Crane  [2020 to date]

• Founder and Curator of the Audrey Chisholm Award at Birr Festival of Music  [2020 to date] 

• Founding Chairperson of Music Education Action Group in January 2001, which produced a Report Music Education: The Poor Relation (April 2002) that the Government piloted and ultimately led to the foundation of Music Generation

• Member of the United Arts Club and its Fundraising Committee

• Member of the Dublin Philharmonic Society and concert host

• Host Family for Dublin International Piano Competition, Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition, Pipeworks International Organ Competition, Beethoven Bootcamp, etc.

• General supporter of a range of music organisations including Royal Irish Academy of Music; Dublin Youth Orchestras; National Youth Orchestra of Ireland; Feis Ceoil, etc.