An insider's guide to education.

He may have been shifted to Higher Education Authority (HEA) in difficult circumstances but Michael Kelly, chairman of the authority, has clearly managed to impress some key people.

Kelly, you will recall, is the former secretary general of the Department of Health who was parachuted into the HEA two years ago. His appointment followed publication of the Travers report on the illegal charges levied on patients in public nursing homes and other long-stay facilities. Kelly and his Minister, Micheál Martin, had, shall we say, differing perspectives on how events unfolded.

At the time, the appointment of an "outsider" like Kelly caused dismay in education circles but he has, apparently, confounded these critics. In recent weeks, the Government has endorsed Mary Hanafin's suggestion that Kelly should continue as full-time chairman until the summer. After that, he will work as a part-time chairman with HEA chief executive Tom Boland.

We all know school principals are an overworked and underappreciated lot who somehow manage to combine the role of school leader with countless other tasks.

Now comes news of one Dublin principal, contacted by a distraught pupil at home recently. The emergency? The pupil in question had . . . wait for it . . . left her tickets for the Pussycat Dolls (right) in a school locker. Needless to say, the principal drove the seven miles from his home, raced to the locker room and secured the tickets.

How many other CEOs would be as decent?

Trinity's decision to shut down its acting course has been a PR disaster for the university. One curious element of the controversy has been TCD's insistence that all queries go through its press office, preferably in written form.

It is a Soviet-style policy which reflects TCD's old-fashioned approach to the hacks. Those opinionated Trinity academics have also been told that interviews with the media must first be cleared by management. It does rather beg the question - if TCD

houses some of the cream of Irish academic talent, well used to defending their viewpoints in the academic forum - then why not put them forward to answer media queries face to face?

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