FOR THE past year President McAleese has juggled her day job of public engagements and meeting heads of state with evening lectures on the finer details of Catholic Church law.
Yesterday she received a higher diploma in canon law by the Milltown Institute, the Dublin college which specialises in theology, philosophy and spirituality.
A spokesman for Áras an Uachtaráin confirmed that she had received the diploma, but said it was a personal matter. "The adult education course was done privately in her own time," he said.
The course begins and ends with a summer school, but the main work consists of weekly four-hour-long evening lectures.
Canon law has always been a particular area of interest for the President, but until this course started the study of canon law was largely confined to men preparing themselves for the priesthood.
This diploma is a foundation course and successful graduates may then complete an MA in canon law. It is not clear whether President McAleese will continue her studies at Milltown.
The college said that it did not want to comment on President McAleese's conferral, as it wished to protect her privacy.
College life is nothing new to the President, who graduated in law from Queen's University in Belfast in 1973. Two years later she was appointed Reid Professor of Criminal Law, Criminology and Penology at Trinity College, Dublin. She returned to Queen's University in 1987 to become director of the Institute of Professional Legal Studies and later she became the first female pro-vice-chancellor of the university.
The President is due to complete her second seven-year term at Áras an Uachtaráin in 2011.
