Technical education. Essays dedicated to the memory of Michael Clune

Following the death of our colleague, Michael Clune, in 1983, it was decided by a group of his friends to produce a collection of essays in his memory. For many years Michael was a teacher with the City of Dublin Vocational Education Committee but also had a wide intellectual interest in the political and social questions of Irish society. As part
of his M.Ed. degree in Trinity College, Dublin, Michael wrote a thesis on the topic Horace Plunkett, the origins and development of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction and the political context, 1895-1907. He delivered papers at the Educational Studies Association of Ireland conferences and his paper entitled 'The inquiry into the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction and Horace Plunkett's resignation as Vice-President, 1906-1907' was published in the Proceedings of the 5th. Annual
Conference of the E.S.A.I. (1980). Michael wrote both in English and in Irish and was an active member of the Society for Co-operative Studies in Ireland and of the Teachers' Union of Ireland. Michael's pioneer research work into the long neglected origins of technical education in Ireland and his keen grasp of political issues and his incisive prose made his writings a valuable contribution to the history of education. We feel that his work can best be constructively adknowledged by this group of essays.