New post-graduate scholarship exchange programme between San José and Dublin

10 Oct 2012

(From left) Prof Brian MacCraith, president of DCU; Lord Mayor of Dublin Mr Naoise Ó Muirí; DCU student Barry Cannon; and Stephen Quigley of SisterCities

A new exchange programme for post-graduate students has been launched by the San José-Dublin Sister City alliance. As part of the exchange programme, students at master’s level from Ireland who avail of the scholarship will be able to get work experience at technology companies based in San José, California.

As well as this, students will also get academic training at both San José State University (SJSU) and Dublin City University (DCU), leading to an industrial master’s of science and engineering degree.

The San José-Dublin Sister City alliance itself was set up in 1986 to promote cultural, economic, artistic and sporting ties between both cities.

The aim of this new exchange scholarship is to deepen existing economic ties while providing San José companies with access to Ireland’s most promising engineering talent. Partners in the programme are DCU, SJSU and San José-based company Cypress Semiconductor.

The first student to be chosen for the scholarship is DCU student Barry Cannon. He will avail of a US$30,000 scholarship. It will include a semester at DCU this autumn, a spring 2013 semester at SJSU coupled with a part-time research internship at Cypress Semiconductors, a full-time summer 2013 research internship at Cypress and a final semester of study at DCU during the autumn of 2013.

While at Cypress, Cannon will be working with a team of engineers and scientists from San José and the Ukraine working in the area of capacitive sensor development. The research will involve developing new touchscreen sensor patterns and stackups, with the aim of improving the performance of the technology behind capacitive touchscreens.

“I’m honoured by the opportunity to study at San José State University and work with Cypress in San José, which is as far as I’m concerned the epicentre of advancement in applied physics and mathematics,” said Cannon.

In 2015, the San José-Dublin Sister City alliance is hoping to extend the programme to include a reciprocal exchange of two students from San José and two students from Dublin each year.

And, in 2016, the aim is to expand the scholarship beyond DCU and SJSU to include other Irish and Silicon Valley universities.

Carmel Doyle was a long-time reporter with Silicon Republic

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