Roscrea student will travel to China for UN competition
The four students from DCU were chosen from over 1,500 applications
A Roscrea student is among four business students from Dublin City University (DCU) who will travel to China next month to present a project focused on promoting the Irish language as part of a prestigious international competition.
Roscrea's Simon Madden will visit China with his classmates Lucas Spicer, Wojciech Karatysz, and Szymon Standa to take part in the UN hosted event. They were chosen from among 1,500 applications from 50 countries.
They were selected as one of the 15 international teams to reach the final round of the International Youth Innovation Competition on Public Policy and Global Development, which aims to “propose innovative public policy solutions aimed at preserving cultural diversity.”
The competition is being hosted by Renmin University of China in Beijing, with an additional camp in Suzhou, near Shanghai.
Simon is well known in his hometown of Roscrea and recently qualified from DCU with a First Class Honours Degree having completed a Marketing Innovation and New Technology degree course.
Simon completed his secondary education at Cistercian College Roscrea and only recently started his Master's course in Notre Dame University in South Bend Indiana in the United States.
“We looked at different cultures and regions around the world and how they managed to preserve their languages, as well as the techniques and policies they used," Simon Madden explained.
“In the Irish context, we see the policies we are proposing beginning with a three-year Pilot Activation Plan in Galway and then expanding nationally afterwards.”
As few of the Chinese judges are likely to speak Irish, the team is using the short film Yu Ming Is Ainm Dom (My Name is Yu Ming) as part of their policy document.
“We thought the film would give the Chinese judges excellent insight into the difficulties faced by a young Chinese man trying to hear Irish spoken after arriving in Ireland—even though he had become fluent while still in China!”
There has been considerable interest in the proposal put forward by the Irish team and they received a letter from President Catherine Connolly wishing them luck in China.