First prize winners Lauren Hayes, Lucy O'Byrne and Ciara-mae Somers with Alexandra Voss
First prize winners Lauren Hayes, Lucy O’Byrne & Ciara-Mae Somers with prize presenter Alexandra Voss
Wednesday, 22 May 2024

We are delighted to announce that we had a great, first hybrid Centre for Irish-German Studies Video Competition at the Goethe Institut in Dublin, for final year students of German (with our technical expert and research assistant Natascha Guggi managing behind the scenes). It was again judged by an expert panel (consisting of the Irish ambassador in Germany H.E. Dr Nicholas O’Brien, the German ambassador in Ireland H.E. Cord Meier-Klodt, the Goethe Institut director Ulrike Gasser, the CEO of the German-Irish Chamber of Commerce Alexandra Voss and Derek Scally, Berlin correspondent of the Irish Times) and a popular vote (each 50%). The winning group (Lauren Hayes, Lucy O’Byrne & Ciara-Mae Somers) impressed with a video on „Eine neue Heimat für die Iren in Deutschland – Berlin“ – inspired by the Erasmus stays of the students in Germany and executed with a lot of creativity and knowledge. Second place was also a UL group (Julie Cizek, Francis Donnelly and Amy O’Leary) while the third prize went to a group from the University of Galway (Valerie Hayes, Lauren Mohan, Niamh McManus). Thanks so much to the German-Irish Chamber of Industry and Commerce for their generous support and huge congratulations to the winners and indeed all the participants as all five videos showed a wonderful engagement with Irish-German relations and impressive research and communication skills – also shown in the great conversations after each video with the wonderful Irish Times correspondent in Berlin, Derek Scally.

Well done all!