NUI Galway has established a new Irish language audience research initiative in partnership with RTÉ
Fíos Físe will investigate the reach, satisfaction levels and listening habits of Irish speakers, on the island of Ireland, with regard to RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta. It is the first time that the views of Raidió na Gaeltachta’s core target audience will be investigated on a regular and ongoing basis. The project will be run by Acadamh na hOllscolaíochta Gaeilge.
An audience research panel of 500 contributors, representative of the Irish speaking population throughout Ireland, north and south, will be recruited. Linguistic, geographical and demographic criteria will inform the composition of this panel. Participants will complete a weekly online survey, the results of which will be submitted to RTÉ on a regular basis. This research will be of significant value to NUI Galway, particularly in the context of Acadamh na hOllscolaíochta Gaeilge’s teaching and research programme in Irish-language broadcasting.
Gearóid Mac Donncha, Acting Head of RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta, welcomed the proposal, and said that it would assist greatly in the planning and management of the service in the coming years, “Regular feedback regarding the broadcast service, and audience analysis, which will be available to us now, will greatly enhance service delivery.
“It will give us a better insight into listener preferences, within the Gaeltacht and outside, and therfore assist us in devising our strategy going forward. Regular and detailed audience research data regarding our core audience has not been available to date, and we look forward to drawing on the research output for the benefit of RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta listeners.”
“This new research initiative will augment the audience research we have been undertaking for TG4 since 2013, and builds on the audience research model established in conjunction with TG4 at that time,” said Project Director Séamas Ó Concheanainn. Dr Eilís Ní Dhúill has been recently recruited to the position of Postdoctoral Researcher with the project.
NUI Galway and RTÉ today also signed a Memorandum of Understanding for a new MA (Cleachtas Gairmiúil sna Meáin) in professional practice in media, with an emphasis on practice-based learning through Irish at a number of RTÉ studios. This new MA programme will be offered by Acadamh na hOllscolaíochta Gaeilge at NUI Galway from September 2018. It will be available on both a full-time and a part-time basis.
This flexible and innovative programme combines online academic modules with significant periods of practice-based work experience in RTÉ in journalism, broadcasting and content creation for radio, television and online platforms.
“Among RTÉ’s challenges around Irish-language output are identifying clearly our audiences so that we may best serve them, and also ensuring that we enable future media practitioners to continue to provide the high-quality services provided by RTÉ as Gaeilge.
“That RTÉ have been able to work with NUI Galway with the aim of fulfilling these two key challenges shows the enormous value of partnership, and the importance of building on the continuing relationship between our two organisations.” said RTÉ’s Group Head of Irish Language, Rónán Mac Con Iomaire.
The programme director, Dr Uinsionn Mac Dubhghaill, noted “with its balanced mix of the theoretical study of media and practice-based learning the new MA programmeresponds to a demand from students for postgraduate programmes that have strong links to employers and the market”.
