Education: BA (Int) Irish and Geography, 2000 MSc i nGnó & Teicneolaíocht an Eolais (2001) with Fiontar DCU
After college, I knew I wanted to get into business of some sort, particularly something creative. Marketing was just a more colourful side of business for me.
I took a job in Finance and Customer Services in L’Oreal to get my foot in the door because I knew that there would be some amount of marketing involved. I spent around six years in that company, working my way up to Product Manager. I heard through the grapevine that the director of Stillwater was finding it difficult to get someone with good marketing experience who spoke Irish. I ended up getting in contact with him and within a fortnight, they’d offered me a position. The opportunity to use Irish in Stillwater was definitely something that persuaded me to take this job because I’ve always wanted to be able to incorporate Irish into my work life.
Education: BSc in Airgeadas, Ríomhaireacht & Fiontraíocht (now BA Gnó & Gaeilge) with Fiontar DCU, 2000
Postgrad Dip in Education (Primary), 2003
I had thought about teaching when I was in transition year in school but by the time I got to sixth year I was more interested in business subjects. I decided to do a business degree through Irish with Fiontar DCU. I liked the innovative idea behind it and the enterprise aspect of the course really appealed to me. The fact that it was through Irish was an added bonus for me. There were a few of us in the class who had not gone to Gaelscoileanna but we learnt quickly.
The 2009 DCU Celtic Ball took place on March 4th in the Alexander Hotel on Merrion Square, Dublin 2. Fiontar students on the committee of An Cumann Gaelach DCU were heavily involved in organising the event and many Fiontar students and graduates attended the event.
After a 3-course meal and music from Transmitter, the craic went on late into the night with more music from the DCU Trad Band, DJ and plenty of alcohol!
As part of their third-year Research Methods module, some of the Fiontar students surveyed visitors to Oireachtas na Gaeilge 2008 about their spending at the event.
Despite a few long nights out, the students managed to conduct a comprehensive survey and analysed the results back at the Fiontar computer labs in DCU.
Des Bishop even filled out a survey for the Fiontar students!
Fiontar graduate Aoife O'Driscoll is one of the entrepreneurs profiled in the 2007 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) Report. The GEM report, part of a global assessment of entrepreneurial activity, chose Aoife due to her outstanding success with her ElevEase product.
The idea for the Elevease Shower Step came to Aoife in the second year of her degree with Fiontar. It makes leg shaving, leg and foot washing, exfoliating and applying tanning lotion easier and safer. During her final year, she put together a business plan for the idea and set up Concepts Plus Ltd to develop the product.
Aoife came into DCU on October 20th 2008 to speak to the current Fiontar students about her business experiences and to give advice to the final year students who will be starting to developing their own business plans in February 2009!
Job: Head of Marketing and Development at 
Job: Primary School Teacher
As part of their third-year Research Methods module, some of the Fiontar students surveyed visitors to Oireachtas na Gaeilge 2008 about their spending at the event.
Logainm.ie, the official placenames database of Ireland, was launched on October 1st 2008 at Government Buildings by Minister Éamon Ó Cuív.
Fiontar graduate Aoife O'Driscoll is one of the entrepreneurs profiled in the 2007 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) Report. The GEM report, part of a global assessment of entrepreneurial activity, chose Aoife due to her outstanding success with her ElevEase product.
