Team Sligo are leading a multi agency group initiative including, Sligo Chamber, IT Sligo, Western Development Commission, Sligo County Enterprise Board, Enterprise Ireland, IDA and Sligo County Council in hosting a forthcoming seminar in the Sligo is Enterprising series of seminars.
Event: Sligo is Enterprising – Attracting Technology Companies to Sligo
Venue: Digital Depot, Roe Lane (off Thomas Street) Digital Hub, Dublin
Date: Thursday 24th May 2012
Time: 6.30pm to 8pm
The aim of this event is to promote Sligo as an ideal location for technology and software companies to relocate or set-up their operations in Sligo. The key objective of this event is to:
- Promote the benefits of working with one of Ireland’s most progressive Third Level Colleges.
- Promote advantage of graduate output from IT Sligo.
- Promote quality of life in Sligo and its natural hinterland.
- Promote a comprehensive and unified approach of Sligo.
- The event will be attended by eminent business people who have shown interest or have the potential to relocate or decentralise business units. The event will also provide a platform for companies that have already set up or relocated to Sligo to present on their experiences since setting up their operations in Sligo.
The very successful Team Hermes from IT Sligo will present their award winning project in the Microsoft Imagine Cup 2011.
Target Audience for Seminar:
• Business contacts from all agencies that have shown an interest in setting up an operation outside Dublin.
• CEOs and high level managers in technology operations in Dublin.
• High level Sligo business people working outside Sligo.
• Department Heads from various industry sectors within IDA and EI.
• Key Technology and Software prominent journalists.
Event Format:
• Padraig McKeon, Drury Communications will chair the event and the Panel discussion.
• Brief presentations from Sligo based technology companies
• Presentation from IT Sligo and Team Hermes
• A panel of experts answering questions from the audience to include:
Philip Flynn, CEO Digital Hub
John Kelly, Citirix Ireland
Fiona O’Grady – Microsoft
Following on from its success in 2011, Enterprise & Innovation Week hosted by IT Sligo’s Innovation Centre will take place from Tuesday March 20th – Friday March 23rd 2012.
Enterprise and Innovation Week is a week-long programme of Seminars, Workshops and Events to promote innovation, entrepreneurs and creativity.
For further info and booking details log on to itsligo.ie
– Digital Hub launches Irish leg of Dare to be Digital –
The gaming industry offers Sligo students some of the most viable and exciting career opportunities in Ireland today. That’s according to Dr. Stephen Brennan, Director of Marketing and Strategy with the Digital Hub Development Agency (DHDA), who was speaking earlier this week at the launch of the Irish leg of Dare to be Digital.
Dare to be Digital is an international video games development competition for third-level students. In Ireland, it is coordinated by the DHDA, and supported by the North-South Cooperation Unit at the Department of Education and Skills.
“This competition offers students from Sligo – and throughout Ireland – a foot in the door of the gaming industry, which – without doubt – is one of the most exciting and booming industries in the country,” said Dr. Stephen Brennan. “Not only is it bucking the trend by creating jobs at a time of national recession, it is also continuously evolving in response to new technological developments.
“Many of the jobs on offer in gaming today didn’t even exist four or five years ago. And it’s not just those with technological or mathematical skills who should consider gaming as their choice of career – in addition to coders and programmers, it also presents opportunities for artists, designers, sound engineers, translators, marketers and animators.
“The Government’s newly published Action Plan for Jobs names digital games as one of the industries that will receive support to double in size over the next two years. This means thousands of new jobs for those ready to take their place in this new workforce.”
In Ireland, Dare to be Digital has a strong focus on promoting cross-border links: teams applying to enter the competition must include students from third-level institutions in both Northern Ireland and the Republic.
Teams of five students – usually a mix of artists, programmers and audio specialists – can apply. Successful applicants will spend nine weeks at Abertay University in Scotland in summer 2012, developing prototype video games and receiving mentoring from industry experts. Participating students receive a weekly stipend of £150 each, free accommodation at the University’s halls of residence, and a team budget of £200.
At the end of the competition, the students’ prototypes are displayed at talent showcasing event Dare ProtoPlay. The general public and industry experts get to play and vote for the games. The three highest-scoring teams receive prizes of £2,500 and the chance to attend the BAFTA Video Games Awards to compete for the coveted ‘Ones to Watch’ award.
“This is a very real opportunity for Sligo students to make a name for themselves within the games industry,” said Dr. Brennan. “At Abertay, participating teams get to meet and work with mentors from some of the biggest names in gaming – companies like Sega, Sony and Rockstar. In terms of career development, participating in this competition is invaluable – not only do students get fantastic networking and mentoring opportunities, but they also get to develop a prototype game, which for many of them goes on to present a viable business opportunity.”
The launch of Dare to be Digital was addressed by Jamie McCormick, Marketing Manager with Gala Networks Europe, a leading publisher of free-to-play multiplayer online games; Alan Boyce, Chief Operating Officer at Nevermind Gages, a start-up established as a result of Dare to be Digital; Brigid McManus, Secretary General at the Department of Education and Skills; Maria Ginnity, Head of Enterprise Policy with Forfás; and Eleanor Thomson, the Dare to be Digital Project Coordinator at the University of Abertay.
Further information about Dare to be Digital is available at:
http://www.thedigitalhub.com/learning/current-learning-projects/53 and www.daretobedigital.com.
AS PART of Safer Internet Day 2012, the National Parents Council (NPC) Primary will deliver internet safety workshops for parents at the Sligo Education Centre, Ballinode on the 27th February at 7:30pm.
The workshops, organised by the NPC County branches, focus on strategies for improving communication between parents and children and negotiating boundaries to their internet use. Parents will get to speak to young people about how they use the internet, why it is attractive to them and get an insight into children’s main worries when online, such as cyber bullying. Parents will be introduced to strategies to help their children be responsible, effective and safer internet users.
via www.itsligo.ie
The 4th Annual IT Sligo Contemporary Marketing Conference will take place at IT Sligo on Friday, February 17th from 10am to 3pm.
The theme of this year’s conference, which is organised by marketing lecturers at the Institute for the regional business community and for students of the Masters in Marketing, is ‘Innovative Marketing’.
Guest speakers will include Dr. Aidan Daly, Adjunct Professor of Marketing, NUI Galway; Ms. Heather-Ann MacSharry, Director of IDA Ireland and Chairman of the Trustee Board of Bank of Ireland pension fund, former General Manager of Reckitt Benckiser and former Managing Director of Boots Healthcare; and Mr. David Bunworth,former Marketing Director of Bord Gáis Energy, former Head of Sales and Marketing at Esat BT Ireland and former Commercial Director of Aer Lingus.
All interested members of the business community are invited to attend; no registration fee will apply.
If you have any queries, or would like to book a place contact Andrew Lang by email atlang.andrew@itsligo.ie
via sligolearning.blgospot.com
Thursday, January 19, 2012 from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM (GMT)
James Corbett, MissionV
This webinar will look at the results of a virtual worlds programme involving 20 Irish primary schools and supported by the National Centre for Technology in Education.
Lovers of Irish Literature, Music, Culture, Heritage and the Arts might like to know about a podcasting website developed by a Sligo based media company.
Podcasts.ie ~ Voices from Ireland, is a website delivering high quality free audio content from Irish writers of poetry, prose and song as well as documentaries, story telling and radio style programmes about our culture, heritage and the arts.
Podcasts.ie is the brainchild of Jho Harris and Sinéad McClure of All Points West Media Services in Culfadda, County Sligo. Former producers of Artbeat on Mid West Radio. Jho and Sinéad are seasoned radio producers and broadcasters whose work includes a ten year stint at the helm of ‘Artbeat’, they have also worked with Lyric FM on a series dealing specifically with Irish literature and have produced many documentaries on history and heritage and more recently with RTE Junior Radio writing and producing 2 original children’s drama series. A third children’s dramatised story telling series was broadcast on RTE Jnr in late summer 2011.
Their love of the medium of sound and its remarkable ability to transport the listener to places without visual clues and crossover into imagination, coupled with a passion for Irish Literature and Music and more than a dash of experience in the industry brought Jho and Sinéad to found Podcasts.ie, a website dedicated to spreading our unique ability for story telling and our unsurpassed culture and heritage across the world.
The site underwent extensive testing in the latter part of 2009 to ensure ease of use and that maximum sound quality could be maintained without too much strain on bandwidth. After satisfactory testing, the site went live just as 2010 began and has attracted over 1.5 million page views since January 1st 2010. Aside from the fantastic writers who have recorded exclusive content so far, a host of greatly talented people have agreed to add their remarkable work to the site and recently the site was offered the use of the entire back catalogue of RTE Radio’s Documentary On One
On http://www.podcasts.ie you will hear recordings from some of our best writers, song smiths and documentary makers including many from Sligo. You will find exclusive interviews with the writers as well as personal podcasts with the writer sharing the story behind some of their best known work, followed by a reading/ performance of the piece in question. The site offers these podcasts free to the listener with almost 200 podcasts available and as content is being produced constantly, the visitor is offered a place to return to again and again.
On the commercial side, the company can also offer companies, in particular those in the tourism and leisure business’ an opportunity to get their message across using the unique and popular medium of podcasting, a method proving to be far more cost effective than radio advertising.
So if you enjoy all things Irish including stories, readings, unplugged music performances, interesting documentaries delivered through the medium of sound, log on to www.podcasts.ie and enjoy !
As the February 1st CAO deadline approaches, IT Sligo has launched an innovative social media campaign encouraging prospective students to get more familiar with the courses they have on offer.
People who are considering their college options are asked to submit photographs of themselves with the IT Sligo Prospectus. The more wonderful or weird the location, the better!
The competition is an interactive approach to encourage prospective students to get more familiar with the 50-odd CAO options on offer at the Institute.
Operated through the IT Sligo Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/itsligo, the first prize for the Imagine IT Sligo photo competition is an iPad 2 worth almost €500, and two runners up will receive an iPod Touch.
IT Sligo’s Communication Manager, Sinéad McGovern, said that it’s hoped that the competition will make people more aware of the comprehensive range of courses available at the Institute: “Our Prospectus is like a catalogue of our courses and it explains each of them individually – what they involve and what job prospects they offer.
IT Sligo offers a wide range of courses in the areas of science, engineering, business and humanities and it’s important that students understand what they’ll be studying when they make choices in their CAO, and where it can take them in their career,” she said.
Ms McGovern explained that the IT Sligo Prospectus is also available online at the IT Sligo website http://www.itsligo.ie, but she said that the photo competition is designed to get the creative juices flowing; “Whether you are a Leaving Certificate student or a more mature student preparing to return to full time education, it can be a stressful time and we wanted to inject a little fun into the process. Entrants are asked to be as imaginative in their photos as possible and to include a short tag line related to the scene,” she explained.
After the photo submission closing date (February 2nd) a shortlist of the top photographs will be compiled. Shortlisted photos will then be displayed on the IT Sligo Facebook page for members of the public to view and to vote for their favourite.
Full details and terms and conditions of the Imagine IT Sligo photo competition are available at www.facebook.com/itsligo . A copy of the Prospectus will be posted to entrants free of charge.
IT Sligo is a leader in social media in the higher education sector and was shortlisted as a finalist in the Social Media Awards for its Facebook page last year.
Image Caption: Leaving Certificate students Robert Butler and Lauren Sweeney with the IT Sligo Prospectus. Get a photo with the Prospectus and be in with a chance to win an iPad 2! Photo by James Connolly.
FREE Seminar on 2 IT-related themes: ‘Cloud Computing & your Business’ and ‘Choosing an Effective Digital Strategy for your Business’ at the Radisson Blu Hotel, Ballincar, Sligo
- 07 December 2011
- 4.5 hours
- 2.00pm-6.30pm
This FREE Seminar will help you to answer 2 key questions – What is Cloud Computing & is it relevant to my Business? and How can I create an effective Digital Strategy for my Business?
‘Creating an Effective Digital Marketing Plan’ will cover the following topics:
- Facebook, Twitter, Blogging & Pay per click…..how to clarify which is best for YOUR Business
- How to turn your website visitors into customers
- How to understand your website statistics & make informed marketing decisions based on evidence
‘Cloud Computing & your Business’ will cover the following topics:
- What is Cloud Computing & how does it work?
- What are the benefits of Cloud Computing for your business?
- Cloud Computing – What you need to be aware of
- A Demonstration of Cloud Computing & FAQ’s
To Book Your Place, click here>
March 4th, 5th, 6th 2012
Knocknarea Arena, IT Sligo, Ash Lane , Sligo, Ireland
The Sligo Sustainable Futures Conference will attempt to bring a change in attitudes and understandings of the parameters of sustainability and sustainable development within the context of a reduction in social engagement from citizens with the political establishment or orthodoxy amongst large sections of the population.
This cross-border and multidisciplinary conference will link the various Schools of the Institute of Technology, Sligo (Science, Engineering, Humanities and Innovation), national and international networks (ICBAN, Green Link West ) entrepreneurs and innovators in sustainable enterprise, environmental advocacy groups and industrial stakeholders (Emerald Publishing) in a dialogue on the salient issue of sustainability and sustainable development, environmental values and sustainable industry.
Call for papers
This conference has been convened in order to reinforce academic inquiry, advocacy and entrepreneurial development of sustainable initiatives at both local and international levels. Sustainability is intrinsically linked with communities, and the maintenance of the social contact and an engaged citizenry. In addition, sustainability has moved beyond a concern with ‘carbon footprints’, and instead now requires a focus on auditing our ‘sustainability footprint’ through an assessment and decision making process.
Submission Details: Please send your abstracts to Dr. Liam Leonard at leonard.liam@itsligo.ie by December 12th 2011.
Instructions for Contributors: Contributors must locate their paper, poster or presentation within the following Sustainability Matrix as follows: sligosustainability.webs.com
For more information log on to : sligosustainability.webs.com | On Facebook
Digital Sligo 