Department: Computer Science
Vacancy ID: 005862
Closing Date: 28-Jun-2020

The Senior Academic Leadership Initiative

Ireland recognises that for Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to perform to their full potential, they need to address the persistent under-representation of women at senior academic levels and increase the numbers of women involved in decision-making processes in HEIs. Ireland aims to be a ‘world-leading country for gender equality in higher education by 2026’ as stated in the government’s Gender Equality Taskforce Action Plan 2018-2020.

Now, Ireland is leading the drive to accelerate gender balance at the highest point of the academic career path through a government-backed scheme, focused on attracting outstanding female academics in Ireland and globally to avail of this unique opportunity to experience working within the higher education sector in Ireland.

The Senior Academic Leadership Initiative (SALI) aims to help achieve equality of outcome in the higher education sector.

New and additional senior academic leadership posts have been funded in areas where:

• there is clear evidence of significant gender under-representation;
• where this appointment will have significant impact within the faculty/department/functional unit and the HEI;
• where they would be a proportionate and effective means to achieve accelerated and sustainable change within an institution.

These posts are new and additional to the sector and they will be funded through new and additional funding provided specifically to help progress gender balance among academic staff at senior levels.

The key objective of this initiative is to attract outstanding female applicants both nationally and internationally. The initiative will also assist in increasing the number of women involved in the decision-making processes in the institutions, as advocated in the EU Commission Strategy on Promoting Equality in Decision Making. In securing posts under this initiative, Maynooth University has demonstrated its commitment to gender equality. Our institution has demonstrable plans for future developments in this area and has outlined the organisational and cultural initiatives in place to support the newly appointed staff.

In line with the objectives of the Higher Education Authority SALI Call 2019, applications from highly qualified female candidates will be prioritised within the boundary of what is legally permissible, in order to address their underrepresentation. In exceptional circumstances, applications from candidates who are in a minority or protected under Irish social legislation, or who also belong to an underrepresented minority in academic posts may be considered if the institution can clearly articulate reasons worthy of legal protection as to why they should be considered.

The Role

Maynooth University seeks an outstanding individual to join our staff as Professor of Computer Science. The person appointed will have an excellent record in research, teaching, scholarship and publication. They will be expected to make a strong contribution to the internal and external profile of the university, and to provide ongoing leadership for the discipline of Computer Science.

The ideal candidate will be an internationally recognised computer scientist with demonstrable expertise in software and society, or closely aligned with our BSc and MSc programs in Computer Science and Software Engineering, or any area that complements or enhances an existing area of research strength within the department or the affiliated inter-departmental research institute, the Hamilton institute. These include Artificial Intelligence, Cognitive modelling, Computer Science education, Computer vision, Data analytics, Dependable Software, DNA and Molecular Computing, Formal Methods and software verification, Foundations of Computer Science, GeoComputation, Image and optical processing, Information theory, Machine learning, Multimedia signal processing, Natural language processing, Robotics, and Theoretical Computer Science.

For the first year the appointment will be free of teaching duties to enable the candidate to focus on establishing an active research programme, and the university will provide active start-up support.

Maynooth University is committed to a strategy in which the primary university goals of excellent research and scholarship and outstanding education are equally valued. Professors will be expected to provide intellectual leadership through a demonstrated commitment to education and research, and to contribute to the effective management of the department, faculty and university.

Professor A (Post 1995) salary scale: €117,915 – €151,475 p.a. (6 points)

Appointment will be made in accordance with the Department of Finance pay guidelines.

Closing Date:

23:30 hrs (local Irish time) on Sunday 28th June 2020.

Maynooth University reserves the right to extend this deadline if necessary.

Applications must be submitted by the closing date and time specified. Any applications which are still in progress at the closing time on the specified closing date will be cancelled automatically by the system.

Please see job description for full details of application requirements.

Late applications will not be accepted.

Maynooth University is an equal opportunities employer.
The position is subject to the Statutes of the University.