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Our new technological university represents a great opportunity for the south east of Ireland. SETU is a place where the whole community works together to achieve global impact. This university provides exceptional opportunities for all, from students to businesses and regional partners. We have built this by focusing on transformative learning, openness and co-creation, as well as a will to learn from the best, wherever they are in the world. The education and research we offer at SETU will prepare students for opportunities anywhere in the world. But we also aim to play our part in creating a better region for all of us.

Whether we are inspiring businesses, creating impactful research, or empowering employable graduates, we work with our community to deliver real change and impact. Our aim is to put collaboration at the heart of everything we do. We partner with industry to shape our approach to teaching and develop new services and ideas. We learn from the latest approaches in education and research. And we aim to build global partnerships to give our students - and our region - the best chance of success.

SETU aims to increase the volume, focus and impact of its research activity consistent with the profile of a leading research-led technological university and as the driving force behind an innovation region.

Research focus

  • Increasing the knowledge capital of the region through enhancing the excellence of the research from within the University; 
  • Connecting our quality research and knowledge to our education programmes, teaching and students; 
  • Embedding entrepreneurship and leveraging opportunities for interdisciplinary research; 
  • Applying new knowledge to solve global, national, regional and societal challenges and realise opportunities.

We will elevate the research performance of existing centres and build new centres of excellence in areas of regional need, with a focus on achieving internationally accepted research performance measures. We aim to improve the quality of our research outputs with a particular focus on high-quality research publications, industry relevance, knowledge transfer and impact. We will consolidate and strengthen our support infrastructure for researchers in-order to better support high-quality research and scholarship. As a research-led organisation, the University aims to deepen its culture of research by embedding research on all undergraduate programmes and ensuring strong linkages between teaching and research. We are informed in our planning in relation to Innovation and Research by our governing legislation which identifies several performance targets that require the elevation of research activity, graduate student recruitment and staff qualifications across the University.

Multidisciplinary research

At SETU multidisciplinary research is critical to answer complex problems, opens new areas of research, increase efficiency and to build collaboration both within SETU campuses but also industry and external partnerships.

SETU are using multidisciplinary approach for grand challenges including; Global Health, Sustainable Cities, Cultural Understanding, Human Wellbeing, Transformative Technology and Justice & Equality.

These challenges cover the spectrum of challenges structured by the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).