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There have been hundreds, if not thousands, of people who have contributed to the DUG campaign for an independent, cross-border university in northwest Ireland over the past year. We are grateful for all the support - and would like to mention a few in our first annual awards list. Parliamentarian of the Year (Stormont) Winner: Sinead McLaughlin MLA (nominated for her work on the new Regional Balance Bill) Honourable Mention: Dr Caoimhe Archibald MLA (nominated for refusing to raise student fees)  *** Parliamentarian of the Year (Dáil Éireann) Colm Burke TD (nominated for his long-term championing of an independent university as the last unresolved civil rights demand) *** Parliamentarian of the Year (Westminster) Mike Kane MP (nominated for his recent work on the NI Select Affairs Committee and long-term support for a cross-border NWU) *** Most Significant Government Intervention (Belfast, Dublin & London) £40m Shared Island funding of the new Magee Teaching Block, as sanctioned by Taoiseach Michéal Martin and Tánaiste Simon Harris)  ***   University Leader of the Year (Atlantic Coast) Dr Orla Flynn (President of the multi-campus, federal university, ATU)  *** University Leader of the Year (Eastern Coast) Dr Eucharia Meehan (President of the Dublin Institute for Advance Studies and former co-chair of the Royal Irish Academy Futures All-Ireland Research and Innovation Committee.) *** University Partnership of the Year Queen's University Belfast and Dundalk IT (nominated for the announcement of their formation of a cross-border, federal university) *** Investigative Reporter of the Year Winner: Garrett Hargan, Belfast Telegraph NW Reporter and author of ‘A Scandal in Plain Sight’ *** Newspaper Column of the Year Nominees: Tom Collins (‘Time to stop the rot and give Derry the university it needs and deserves’, Irish News); Tom Collins, (‘UU award cannot disguise its neglect of the North West’, Irish News); Brian Feeney (‘Keep the civil service away from decisions on Derry’, Irish News); Conal McFeely (‘Governments must team up to deliver the NWU’, Derry Journal); Pat McArt (‘So tell me… what are you going to do for the North West?’, Irish News) Joint Winners: Tom Collins (for ‘Time to stop the rot and give Derry the university it needs and deserves’), Brian Feeney & Pat McArt. *** Best Book ‘A New Ireland - A Five Year Review’ by Paul Gosling *** Best Blog Winner: Conal McFeely (Derry must move now to establish its own cross-border university, colmcillepress.com ) *** Find of the Year The Derry Journal’s extended report from July 31, 1850, detailing plans to open an independent university in Derry and to fight Belfast attempts to steal the funding. (Sourced by Seamus Breslin.)  *** Special Award To Professor Gerry McKenna MRIA, who receives the North West University’s Honorary Doctorate 2025, for services to cross-border education in Ireland. [*Garrett Hargan received the first honorary doctorate from NWU upon the publication of his investigative history ‘A Scandal in Plain Sight’ in 2024] ENDS

Oíche Chiúin: Stille Nacht: Silent Night Ceacht 6: Úrchnoc Chéin Mhic Cáinte ~ The Lush Hill of Cian Mac Cáinte Ag ceiliúradh foghlama na Gaeilge trí sheanamhráin ~ Celebrating learning Irish through old songs Curtha in eagar ag Risteard Mac Gabhann Edited by Risteard Mac Gabhann Iomann Nollag a chantar chomh forleitheadach sin ar fud an domhain, gur bhronn UNESCO i 2011 gradam air mar ‘shaothar cruthaitheach dobhraite d’oidhreacht an domhain’. Cumadh an ceol in 1818 ag an cheoltóir Ostaireach Franz Gruber agus na focail ag sagart óg Ostaireach Joseph Mohr. Ó shin i leith, rinneadh é a aistriú go dtí na céadta teanga. Is é Tadhg Ó Donnchadha (1874-1949) a rinne an t-aistriúchán breá Gaeilge seo. Is ón bhunleagan le Mohr an véarsa láir anseo le hómós do bhunús Ostaireach an iomainn. A Christmas hymn, which is so widely known throughout the world that it was declared by UNESCO in 2011 ‘an intangible world heritage creation’. The music was composed in 1818 by the Austrian musician Franz Gruber and the original lyric by a young Austrian priest Joseph Mohr. Since then, it has been translated into hundreds of languages. This fine Irish translation was done by Tadhg Ó Donnchadha (1874 – 1949). The middle verse is from the Mohr version to acknowledge the carol’s Austrian origin. Oíche chiúin, oíche Mhic Dé, Silent night, the night of the son of God, Cách ina suan, dís ar aon, Everyone asleep, the couple both, Dís is dílse ag faire le spéis, Most faithful couple, watching intently, Naíon beag gnaoigheal, ceananntais caomh, A little infant beauty-bright, soft-browed gentle, Críost ‘na chodladh go séimh, Christ softly sleeping, Críost ‘na chodladh go séimh. Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht, Silent night, holy night, Alles schläft, einsam wacht All are asleep, except the watching, Nur das traute hoch heilige Paar. Faithful, most holy pair, Holder Knabe im lockigen Haar, Holy infant in curling hair, Schlaf ’ in himmlischer Ruh , Sleep in heavenly peace, Schlaf ’ in himmlischer Ruh Oíche chiúin, oíche mhic Dé, Silent night, the night of the son of God, Aoirí ar dtús ‘ chuala an scéal, Shepherds first heard the news, Alléluia! aingil ag glaoch, Alleluia! angels calling, Cantain suairc i ngar a’s i gcéin, Joyful singing near and far, Críost an Slánaitheoir féin, Christ the saviour himself, Críost an Slánaitheoir féin. Christ the saviour himself. Beautiful version from Enya here/Leagan álainn ó Enya ar fáil anseo: Oíche Chiúin

By Conal McFeely, Derry University Group The Belfast Telegraph's North West Correspondent, Garrett Hargan, was given a civic award in October 2024 by Mayor Lilian Seenoi-Barr following the publication of his history of the Derry university saga, A Scandal in Plain Sight. (Pic: Martin McKeown) For more than 60 years Stormont, under the guise of its university, NUU/University of Ulster/Ulster University, has deliberately restricted Derry’s growth - and it is continuing to do so today.  This is not a matter of opinion - this is a matter of hard fact. Those in need of comprehensive data and evidence need look no further than Garrett Hargan’s superlative, and aptly-titled, investigative history of UU, A Scandal in Plain Sight.  Almost a decade ago, in the wake of Brexit, it rapidly became apparent that there could be major opportunities and benefits for Derry as the only major city abounding both the EU and the ‘UK’.  Talk was rife of free ports being opened and us becoming the new Hong Kong. In the immediate aftermath of Brexit, the Derry University Group met with the Irish government and proposed that an independent cross-border university could become the cornerstone for regenerating this most disadvantaged region of the island. The new institution, we argued, would also stand as a permanent monument to future good faith between Britain and Ireland - serving as a bridge, not a border. And before long, it became clear that the Irish government was listening. In  2021, the Oireachtas, through its educational leaders in the Royal Irish Academy, formally proposed a new North West University, stretching from Coleraine to Sligo, with Derry as its main hub. Dublin then sponsored a specialised RIA taskforce to produce a more detailed blueprint as to how this could work. The following year, following a meeting with the Derry University Group, the London government also included the proposal for a Derry-centred cross-border university in its first command paper on Legacy. Then in 2024, the Irish followed up with its in-depth roadmap paper on a North West University from the RIA, which was consolidated by Dublin’s offer of £40m for a new university teaching block for Derry. Conal McFeely (r) and Kevin Hippsley of the Derry University Group at the 2022 unveiling of a 55-foot long mural calling for action on the university.   Ulster University and Stormont, however, have relentlessly opposed the move to give Derry any autonomy at every level from the outset - culminating in an extraordinary performance at the NI Select Affairs Committee in Westminster last month, when the clearly-rattled UU Vice Chancellor attempted to dismiss the two RIA papers as some sort of unsanctioned pipe dreams. That, however, was the very same day that Queen’s University and Dundalk IT announced a new partnership to open the island’s first cross-border university - on that model first mooted by the Derry University Group and blueprinted by the RIA.  So UU, yet again, was exposed for what it has been for sixty years - an institution that puts Belfast’s interests first and holds Derry back. The border town of Dundalk - a town less than half the size of Derry - has been struggling for a a long time to acquire university status for its IT campus, which is roughly the same size as Magee. But the cross-border masterstroke only came into being in the last few months. This time last year, it was being suggested Dundalk would attempt to join the Atlantic Technological University (ATU) - which would not have made sense geographically, as it is more than 120 miles from any of the campuses. And the Queens partnership, as roadtested by the RIA, made a lot more sense and was developed in a matter of months - not years. Foyle MP Colum Eastwood has raised the case for an independent cross-border university with the Irish government - and has backed a universities Oversight Commission for the North as recommended by the Royal Irish Academy. Derry is so ready to move forward - independent from the restraints of UU, its anti-North West bias and its crippling debt. UU, remember, has repeatedly refused to invest any of its own resources into Derry - leading to a chronic physical infrastructure shortfall and an accommodation crisis. Its failure to allocate courses in any fair or accountable way, has, for generations, led to our city fighting for scraps with our equally-neglected neighbours in Coleraine, while Belfast (formerly Jordanstown) fills its boots.  We have the support from Dublin (though incredibly UU wasn’t able to find any spare change in the £40m grant it was allowed to administer to erect bilingual signage – as is now the law here), we have the student numbers to make an autonomous NW viable, and the blueprint, as devised by the academy is waiting. The Department of the Economy, which supervises Higher Education, is promising an all-encompassing review of the sector. And we will be demanding some genuine game-changers in the form of new all-Ireland HE structures and the introduction of a HE Regulator, which would both scrutinise the North’s university sector and also oversee the dissolution of UU into its component parts.  We will also be calling on Derry, Donegal, Sligo and Coleraine to develop a regional economic/educational partnership to deliver the RIA’s NWU vision, in tandem with sponsors such as the Dublin government and others. This needs to happen immediately. Dundalk went from bit player to being a partner in the island’s first cross-border university in a matter of months.  Dundalk and Queen’s have shown what can be done when the civic and political will is there. And done quickly. Derry’s urgency is even greater. It is time for the political and civic elite - and for the Executive and Derry/Strabane Council - to decide what side they’re on.  The campaign for an independent university was established by John Hume (r) more than sixty years ago. The Nobel Laureate is pictured here with Nationalist MP Eddie McAteer (l) and Derry's unionist mayor Albert Anderson on the steps of Stormont after 25000 people took part in a cavalcade from Derry in February 1965.