IER News & blogs

Dr Lucy Hearne from the Department of Education and Professional Studies at the University of Limerick visited IER from 21-24 February. Dr Hearne has been awarded funding by the Irish Research Council for Humanities and Social Sciences (IRCHSS) for new research into the career resilience of career practitioners. She used her visit to undertake some data collection with Adult Guidance Practitioners in the region, and worked with IER colleague Jenny Bimrose on an academic article submission and developing ideas for potential research collaboration.

IER's Professor Peter Elias was mentioned in a Radio 4 programme "Mark Thomas: The Manifesto", first broadcast at 18:30 on Wednesday 15 February 2012. In the programme, comedian-activist Mark Thomas presented proposals for his People's Manifesto, suggested by members of the audience. One of the proposals was 3 Years' free education for all between the ages of 25 and retirement, to help the economy by retraining and developing people’s skills, and giving them a second chance at higher education. Professor Elias was reported to have countered this proposal with a suggestion that if the aim was to improve access to education, the reintroduction of the Education Maintenance Allowance would be a better way to achieve this.

The programme is available to listen again until Tuesday 21 February.

In the fourth of a series of podcasts about our work at the Institute for Employment Research, Professor Anne Green speaks about her recent work on spatial inequalities in the UK and the importance of sub-national perspectives on employment and skills.

IER's Bernard Casey gave a presentation at the conference "The Cyprus Economy at a Time of European Uncertainty: Managing Reform and Sustainability", organised by the Hellenic Observatory of the London School of Economics and held at LSE on 10-2-12. His talk on "The Fiscal Implications of Demographic Change" gave an overview of the challenges of addressing pension and care provision for Cyprus's ageing population. Other presenters at the event included the Minister of Industry, Commerce and Tourism of the Republic of Cyprus, Prof. Chris Pissarides, winner of the 2010 Nobel Prize for Economics, the head of sovereign debt rating for Europe, Middle East and Africa from Standard & Poor's, experts from the World Bank and the European Commission and academics from the University of Cyprus.

IER co-hosted a day-long workshop entitled "People with learning Disabilities: Promoting Health and Real Jobs" with the Institute of Health at Warwick. The workshop, led by Dr Carol Robinson, a leader in the field of research in this area, reviewed research on health inequalities and barriers to employment for people with learning disabilities. It also looked at policy and practice designed to improve health and to increase the chances of real jobs. IER's Professor Robert Lindley chaired the afternoon session on Employment.