Northwestern hosts Aer Lingus College Football Classic delegation from Ireland

Northwestern hosted a delegation from Ireland on Friday, November 5 to celebrate the partnership between the university and the upcoming Aer Lingus College Football Classic (ALCFC). In August of 2022, Northwestern will face Nebraska at Aviva Stadium in Dublin, Ireland, marking its first ever football game held overseas. The game will be the first of five games in an international series hosted by the ALCFC.

The delegation, primarily made up of ALCFC representatives and select members of the Irish government, was hosted by Northwestern Athletics and Alumni Relations and Development. In addition to several sports-related activities and events, the group also received a special "behind-the-scenes" tour of campus organized by the Office of International Relations. It included visits to the Chemistry of Life Processes Institute and the Charles Deering Library, where they perused Northwestern Archives and its Dublin Gate Theatre Collection. The group also met with representatives from the School of Communication and Kellogg School of Management.

The tour culminated in a lunch, hosted by Vice President for International Relations ​​Dévora Grynspan and attended by select faculty and administrators from several fields including law, chemistry, learning sciences, communication, and business.

“As a global university we fully intend to take advantage of this unique opportunity to expand our activities in Ireland," said Grynspan. "Northwestern's ties to Ireland span from medical education to undergraduate study abroad."

Northwestern sends about a dozen medical students to Trinity College Dublin and the Royal College of Surgeons for clinical rotations each year. Undergraduate students can study abroad at either Trinity College or University College Clark.

At the luncheon, the visitors and Northwestern representatives discussed different ways in which the university can leverage the Aer Lingus College Football Classic to expand academic partnerships with Irish universities.

The football game will kick off the ‘Cats season next year and mark the beginning of a new kind of partnership abroad.