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Meet Lucy Corcoran Lucy Corcoran, PhD (2015) is the Trinity Women Graduates incoming President for 2022. She spoke to Trinity Today about her vision for the coming months Can you tell us about Trinity Women Graduates? Who is involved and what is your mission? Trinity Women Graduates (TWG) was established in 1922, the same year as the Irish Free State and also when Irish men and women were given equal voting rights. TWG was then known as the Dublin University Women Graduates Association. Times were of course very different then, women had to be off campus by 6pm, could not dine in the Dining Hall or join the college debating societies. TWG began as a way for a small group of women graduates to keep in touch with Trinity and each other, and though the name has changed, the overall mission remains the same. TWG has flourished into a vibrant and inclusive community of women who connect, support and inspire each other and future generations of graduates, through a varied programme of events and through the TWG Trinity Access Scholarship and Bursary programmes. How did you personally get involved with TWG and what are your responsibilities as President? I first heard about TWG through a chance meeting with another member who was involved with both TWG and the wider Irish Federation of University Women (IrFUW). She introduced me to the association and described its wonderful work. I was keen to get involved, to give something back, having spent many wonderful years in Trinity, between my undergraduate engineering degree, and later my PhD Research with the School of Engineering and the School of Business. I decided to volunteer on the TWG committee in 2019, and I have supported the association and its many activities and events since then. To celebrate the centenary of TWG the college is hosting a brilliant exhibition, drawing from the TWG archive. What are some of the highlights of the exhibition? TWG is one of the oldest associations in Trinity, and the TWG archive includes a wonderful collection of photos, documents, letters and written recollections. These archived documents tell the story of the long campaign for the admission of women to Trinity. The upcoming exhibition will illustrate and celebrate the achievements of these pioneering early women graduates, and their struggle for equality. Trinity now has 130,000 graduates around the world. How global is TWG’s membership? How do you stay in touch with members? Membership of TWG is open to all women graduates, and we very much welcome and embrace opportunities to connect with our wider international alumni network. In 2020 and 2021, all TWG events were hosted online, which allowed us to connect directly with our international alumni. This move to online TWG events and meetings has also enabled us to include global alumni within the TWG Committee too, where we have great support from a fellow TWG Committee member based in the US. It’s been a tremendous century for women in Trinity. What are some of the challenges still facing Trinity’s female students and graduates? This year we reflect on the significant contribution women have made to Trinity College over the last century. We also reflect, however, on the missed opportunities for the women who were not afforded the opportunity of third level education. We have made much progress in providing equal opportunities for all but we still have a way to travel. It is timely on the 100th anniversary of TWG to reflect on times past and renew our efforts to open up even more graduate opportunities for women.
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Celebrating 100 years of TWG Trinity Women Graduates has partnered with the Trinity Library to develop an exhibition curating TWG’s archive from the past 100 years. The TWG material, donated to Trinity Library in 2018, has been archived, conserved, digitised and catalogued to create this exhibition which will allow us to fully appreciate the contribution of Trinity to the higher education of women in Ireland. The exhibition traces the long campaign for admission, the achievements of early women graduates and the struggle for equality by female students and staff to tell the fascinating story of one hundred years of women in Trinity and the influence of the women graduates on Trinity and Irish society. The Centenary Exhibition will be hosted in the Old Library and can be accessed via the Book of Kells exhibit; a Virtual Exhibition will be open to all from 28 April. A webinar, featuring a tour of the exhibition by the Archivist, is planned to take place on 11 May at 1pm. All welcome to attend. Further details will be posted on trinitywomengraduates.ie The collection features correspondence, minute books, admin records, accounts, photographs, reminiscences of Women Graduates and sources collected for “ A Danger To The Men?: A History of Women in Trinity College, Dublin 1904-2004 ” by Susan Parkes. Click here to view the Centenary Page
