UL President Prof Kerstin Mey resigns

The President of University of Limerick Professor Kerstin Mey has resigned. Staff were informed of the news by UL Chancellor Brigid Laffan earlier.

Prof Laffan said that from September Dr Mey would be taking up a professorship role within the university.

The university said it had no further comment at this time.

UL has been embroiled in controversy in recent months over the purchase of 20 houses close to its campus at a cost of more than €12.5 million, a price subsequently deemed to have been grossly inflated.

Last March, the Higher Education Authority instructed the college’s governing authority to review the purchase of the houses.

That same month ten members of the university’s executive expressed no confidence in Prof Mey’s leadership and staff via their trade unions also expressed no confidence in the president.

The university spent around €630,000 per house in the purchase which was significantly above their market price.

The purchase resulted in a financial impairment for the university of €5.2m.

In March, Chancellor Brigid Laffan told UL staff that the fact that this overspend had occurred so soon after a similar overspend on the former Dunnes Stores site was “completely shocking and alarming”.

The Dunnes Stores site was purchased prior to Professor Mey’s term as president.

Prof Mey became the first female president of an Irish university when she took over in 2020 following the resignation of Dr Des Fitzgerald.

Prior to that, the east Berlin native had been vice president of academic affairs and student engagement at the university.