John Maher, accounting and finance lecturer at South East Technological University (SETU), has been unanimously re-elected as Treasurer of the International Council for Canadian Studies (ICCS) for a further two-year term.
His reappointment was confirmed at the Council’s Annual General Meeting, held at York University in Toronto on 26 June 2025.
Mr Maher, a Waterford native and past pupil of De La Salle College, lectures in finance and international business at undergraduate and graduate level. He is currently involved in three research projects in the financial domain and brings over 30 years of experience in governance and stakeholder representation across educational, scholarly, and financial service bodies at regional, national, and international levels.
As Treasurer, Mr Maher will serve as one of three executive directors of the ICCS, with responsibility for the organisation’s financial management, accounts, and the investment policy governing its endowment fund, managed by the National Bank of Canada.
SETU’s continued representation on the ICCS Executive underlines the university’s international engagement and growing collaboration with Canadian institutions—particularly timely as Canadian universities are now eligible to participate in EU Horizon research funding opportunities. SETU also benefits from potential partnerships through Canada’s National Research Council and is already actively engaged with Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN), a relationship supported by the Centre for Newfoundland and Labrador Studies at SETU.
The ICCS is a Toronto-based higher education organisation that promotes the study of Canada in the humanities and social sciences. Its membership comprises national associations from Europe, Asia, the Americas, Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. It awards doctoral research bursaries annually, enabling postgraduate scholars to undertake research in Canadian universities and research agencies. The Council also recognises excellence through awards for doctoral dissertations, scholarly books in both English and French, and a prestigious Governor General’s Award for service to the discipline.
In addition, the ICCS publishes a peer-reviewed academic journal in partnership with University of Toronto Press and facilitates global collaboration among Canadian Studies scholars. The organisation is a registered charitable body under Canadian law, with the Governor General of Canada as its official patron.
In Ireland, the ICCS is represented by the Association of Canadian Studies in Ireland (ACSI), an all-island body with council members from SETU and six other Irish universities.
Enhanced transport links—such as the new direct WestJet flights between Dublin and St John’s, Newfoundland, available until October 2025—make these connections more tangible. Building on this momentum, the Centre for Newfoundland and Labrador Studies at SETU will launch a new themed lecture series in Semester 1 of the 2025–26 academic year, following the success of last year’s Three Sisters series.
For more about the ICCS, visit: ICCS Awards and Fellowships
To explore the lecture series, see: The Three Sisters Lecture Series