Inside View from Ireland: Qik Sunday News

THE SUNNIEST DAY in months greeted Ireland today along with a pounding headache due to the Irish recession. I reduced the Sunday Business Post (SBP) and the Sunday Times (ST) to 12 minutes, finding interesting stories about the recession [1-6], standards in education [7-10] and technology [11-15]. If I was awarding Oscars for writing, I'd give one to Richard Woods for his feature story in the Sunday Times Magazine [16] because his observations affect every creative in my classroom. I'm experimenting with different settings inside Qik, my preferred live-streaming service. Today's Qik clip suffers a little from my failure to manually set its white balance. I'm also without my preferred mobile mics so the audio levels have regressed to 2008.

Qik Sunday News 7 March 2010

#events

A Social Conversation without Coffee on 10 March in Limerick and eva launches in Limerick on 12 March.

#recession

The Civil Engineering Contractors Association says 10,000 contracting jobs will disappear from late 2010 onwards. Today's State procurement process stops projects. Hotels and guesthouses pay the Irish Exchequer EUR 1500 per room annually. Not only are Irish citizens bailing out the banks, but those banks are increasing the cost of homeowners' mortgages.

1. David McWilliams -- "Salvation in Bright Ideas" in the comment and analysis section of the Sunday Business Post, 7 March 2010.

2. Damien Kiberd, "Don't Turn off the Investment Pipeline" in the Sunday Times, 7 March 2010.

3. Susan Mitchell -- "Hoteliers want qicker rate review", SBP, 7 Mar 10.

4. Susan Mitchell -- "Coach firms call for a new number plate system," SBP, 7 Mar 10.

5. Pat Leahy -- "The real politics of business", SBP, 7 Mar 10.

6. Ian Kehoe -- "Tackling the jobs crisis," SBP,7 Mar 10.

#standards

Even though a lot of debate is raging about academic standards, it's also true that college students are working harder today--and they've acquired tactical studying skills. Ireland did its university students a disservice by undermarking in the past. This trend is very easy to see in American students who spend a year studying in Ireland. All things considered, a streamlined government agency would help, if it was tasked with dealing with qualifications, external Quality Assurance and course approval.

7. John Burns and Mark Paul -- "Everyone's a Winner" in the ST, 7 March 2010.

8. Martha Kearns -- "Education Must Aim for Higher Standards" in the SBP, 7 March 2010.

9. Richard Curran -- "Grade Expectations", SBP, 7 Mar 10.

10. Jennifer O'Connell -- "Off Message" in Agenda magazine, SBP, 7 Mar 10.

#technology

11. Adrian Weckler -- "Best phones for business" in Computers in Business, March 2010.

12. Eithne Shortall -- "Shopping online can save you up to 28% on electronic goods", ST, 7 Mar 10.

13. James Ashton -- "The inventors laying the grid for a data revolution", ST, 7 Mar 10.

14. Adrian Weckler -- "Browsing the best", SBP, 7 Mar 10.

15. Leslie Faughan -- "Digiweb is getting smarter" in the SBP, 7 Mar 10.

#trend

16. Richard Woods -- "The Shooting Party's Over is the feature story in The Sunday Times Magazine, 7 March 2010.