Shane Conway, PhD student in Geography, NUIG has been selected to participate in an Erasmus Intensive Programme Project on sustainability research and policy. The course entitled 'Achieving Sustainable Development on an Island. Social ecology concepts and methods in a real world context' will take place in May 2014 in the UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, Samothraki, Greece. The course is designed as a 13-day excursion to the island of Samothraki in Greece with the aim of learning and applying social ecology approaches in a local setting while building synergies with an on-going UNESCO Man and Biosphere process. Dr. Henrike Rau, National University of Ireland, Galway and member of the Geographical Society of Ireland is a co-organiser of the programme along with colleagues from Vienna Institute of Social Ecology, Alpen Adria University, Lund University, University of the Aegean, and the Autonomous University of Barcelona. 

The School of Geography and Archaeology in NUI Galway was this year’s winner of the annual overall award for best health and safety standard for the University. The School was presented this award for their work in communicating and promoting workplace safety through their web pages. Their web pages bring much of their safety documentation together and provide access by staff and student to the necessary resources as well as raising the profile of their workplace safety requirements.  This is a positive example that other NUI Galway Units can usefully apply. Congratulations to Mr. Joe Fenwick, Dr. Siubhan Comer, Ms. Suzanne Gilsenan, Dr. Aaron Potito and Professor Elizabeth FitzPatrick for their winning work!

Geography at NUI Galway is delighted to welcome three new members to the discipline

Christina Costello is the new Administrative Assistant in Geography. Christina has worked in NUI Galway for over a decade and joined the discipline of Geography in January 2014.

Dr José A. Cortés-Vázquez is an environmental social scientist, drawing on different disciplines such as Human Geography and Social Anthropology and specialising in the study of nature conservation, sustainability and people-park conflicts in southern Europe. Hailing from Spain, Jose has an MA from University of Kent and a PhD from Pablo Olavide University. He joined the discipline in September 2013 and is currently studying new phenomena related to the privatisation of nature conservation and the conceptualisation of the role Protected Areas play in the expansion of global capitalism in Europe's post-financial crisis context. 

Physical geographer, Dr Audrey Morley joined Geography in NUIG in Autumn 2013. After completing her Bachelor of Arts in Geography and Archaeology, University College Dublin, Audrey travelled to the US to complete a Master of Science in Quaternary and Climate Studies, Climate Change Institute, University of Maine, Orono. She obtained her Doctor Rerum Naturalium in Geosciences, from the University of Bremen, Germany. Audrey’s central research objective is to understand how regional climate instabilities develop into abrupt hemispheric and global climate change. Specifically, she focuses on the response of the North Atlantic to climate forcing mechanisms during the Holocene (10.000 years) by examining atmosphere-ocean circulation systems and their potential role in controlling, propagating, and amplifying climate instabilities into abrupt climate change.