Letters to the Editor: Snapchat’s AI undermines academic integrity
We need to expand our dialogue about Snapchat’s risks to include how AI integration affects academic integrity and genuine student engagement. Teachers and parents need training and information on this now.
With the average price of a cup of coffee around €3.65, society is in need of a consumer cost-neutral space and there is the potential for the 330 public libraries to meet this need of our communities.
The concept of a ‘third space’ is the utilisation and personalisation of places outside the workplace and the home. In Ireland, the pub was historically our nation’s third space of choice but the home is now the most frequently reported location for alcohol consumption among Irish adults.
We have seen the rise in popularity of Irish cafe culture, but with the CSO’s consumer price index reporting that the cost of coffee is rising and with companies such as Starbucks making a profit of €5.87bn last year, an increase of 27% from 2022, price is factoring into people’s ability to partake in these third spaces.
With 765,000 registered members, Irish libraries are still cherished widely but people tend to view visiting a library as an individualistic experience — popping in to borrow a book or use the IT facilities.
But reimagining space within our libraries could mean allocating a place for locals to chat, meet, and interact — all key requirements for a thriving society.
Libraries are so much more than just a place to borrow the latest Claire Keegan novel — they are a learning hub for immigrants looking to learn English, an outreach space for the elderly, even a sensory haven for neurodiverse people who can make use of sensory rooms in many refurbished libraries.
Libraries are one of the last free spaces left — giving teenagers a place to spend a rainy afternoon or those who live alone a place to connect with others.
Twenty years ago, we never could have imagined the range of electronic resources available today, so it should encourage us to be imaginative now — seeing beyond the approaches we have always taken to library spaces.
A reimagining of our library spaces could mean creating places where it would be encouraged to gather in groups, meeting friends and neighbours, as coffee shops are places where money is required and time is limited.
As well as meaning ‘book’, the Latin root of the word ‘library’ also means ‘free’ — so investment by the new government could mean a broader offering and a new way we view these beloved buildings.
He loves teachers and makes a valid point: The Dáil should consist of people from diverse backgrounds. As always he is outspoken, controversial, and is box-office gold. He has advocated for voters to give Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael their votes. This is not rocket science, as the outgoing government got us through Brexit and covid — and the economy is awash with money.
The two main parties are like twins and with different views and flavours and Taoiseach Simon Harris has now put Fine Gael in a much better place, Tánaiste Micheál Martin is a popular, well-respected, and formidable politician whose leadership is safe for another five to seven years.
Ireland needs strength and leadership and these two political managers are the best of the crop at this time as we go to the polls. especially now that the Trump presidency is coming fast.
Sinn Féin’s popularity has steadily declined. Mary Lou McDonald’s decision to table a motion of ‘no confidence’ in the minister for justice and the Garda Commissioner immediately after the Dublin riots was a huge mistake. She avoided media for a month during recent scandals in the party, and their housing plan fell flat on its face once the banks declined to confirm it would provide mortgages and prospective buyers would not own the land the houses were built on.
Now the Sinn Féin leader is threatening to freeze rents just when the clear evidence is that landlords are leaving the market at an alarming rate. How will this ill-conceived, hare-brained policy help tenants?
Labour would love to be back in Government with all that money around. On a great election day they might get six or seven seats inching their way back into another coalition.
And as for People Before Profit, what do they stand for? Apart from making a lot of noise.
Ireland needs stability and a Government that makes its decisions here in Dublin.
New Fortress plans to export their fracked gas from Flint, Pennsylvania, USA, where they continue to poison the land, air, and soil there with impunity.
Federal funds pay for truckloads of safe water to be transported to Flint daily, and now it’s looking very possible that we might be importing the very same nefarious ‘natural gas’.
Can senator Róisín Garvey, who represents the Green Party in North Clare, please ensure us that Action 17 in the Energy Policy Accelerated Implementation Plan is revoked immediately? It is imperative this happens before a new Government is formed.
We are a tiny country, our agriculture industry relies on clean water and soil to flourish. We are jeopardising our core resources for a quick buck. If even one fracking company gets in, our waterways will be compromised, clean water from the Shannon to Dublin proposal won’t happen.
One drill requires several million gallons of water to operate, the wells produce methane gas (unburned methane released into the atmosphere has more than 80 times the warming power of CO2) along with the methane produced by our dairy herd we will be very far off our EU climate targets. Hazardous chemicals in waste water from fracking leech back into waterways and soil.
The financial burden will be back on the taxpayer, possibly have to import water fit for humans. Will our gardens and vegetables, our greenhouses for our strawberries, and our floury spuds be destroyed with this contaminated water?
I hope that this won’t happen on Ms Garvey’s watch; hopefully she can see through the spin and sparkle.