Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) Targets International Graduate Students

Case Study
Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland

Challenge

Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI), established in 1784 to train Ireland’s surgeons, is today a leading university of medicine and health sciences providing undergraduate, postgraduate, and professional education and training on an international scale to health care professionals. RCSI’s new strategic plan aims to increase the international PhD student population at its graduate school and, in the absence of undergraduate science courses, wanted to determine if developing a summer research program for undergraduate students would serve as an effective feeder to its postgraduate doctoral programs.

Solution

Hanover first analyzed best practices of recruiting international PhD students in the health sciences and determined that undergraduate summer science programs were an effective recruitment tool. Hanover then conducted interviews with seven program administrators, which revealed insights on how RCSI should structure, fund, and implement its summer programs as well as best practices on student recruitment.

Outcome

Using Hanover’s research, RCSI is able to:

Expand marketing in countries with high populations of PhD students likely interested in international study
Develop a summer research program to build a pipeline to graduate school recruitment

“This report from Hanover has provided the RCSI Senior Management Team and our School of Postgraduate Studies with invaluable benchmarking insights as we develop our international PhD recruitment strategy.”
—Professor Hannah McGee, Dean, Faculty Of Medicine And Health Sciences, RCSI