Research Centres
Euro SDR
Since the academic year 2003/04 the Secretariat of EuroSDR (European Spatial Data research) is based in the School. The School has a Memorandum of Understanding with EuroSDR, to host the administration of the organisation. Senior Lecturer Kevin Mooney in the Department of Spatial Information Sciences received the unanimous vote of the eighteen member countries to become the new Secretary-General of EuroSDR for a term of four years. The centre is based in the School premises in DIT Bolton Street. Ms Stephney Moore has been appointed as Assistant to the Secretary-General.
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Knocksink Wood NEEC
Since the late 1990s the School has been involved in taking responsibility for the National Environmental Education Centre in Knocksink. The centre is located in Knocksink Wood close to Enniskerry, 25 km from the centre of Dublin. The centre is not owned by DIT but DIT is committed to look after the day to day running of the centre on behalf of the National Parks and Wildlife Service in the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government.
Primarily the centre provides one-day educational courses and field trips in nature studies for primary schools as well as on nature and environment themes for secondary schools. Disadvantaged schools in particular have benefited from this through non-paying courses of this type. The School Spatial Planning has been using the facility also in the context of its own undergraduate and postgraduate courses as a 'laboratory' for its environmental courses, as a fieldtrip base and as a field centre for dissertation research.
The centre has been run by a dedicated team of committed people on different contracts. The Centre received the 2000 Regional Community Initiative Award. The key ethos of the centre is 'training through environmental awareness'. Skills of different types are developed in the centre through the activities undertaken by participants. These skills include education and interaction with children and young adults, management of an interpretative centre, basic administrative and office skills, outdoor skills etc.
