Over three days, RCSI ran tours of the College on St Stephen’s Green as part of National Heritage Week 2017. This annual celebration of Ireland’s natural, built and cultural heritage saw RCSI offered historic tours to the public on Monday 21, Tuesday 22 and Wednesday 23 August.

During the tours, guests learned of the rich heritage of the College, which was established in 1784 and has been on St Stephen’s Green since 1810. Tours explored the part the College has played in local and national history, including when the building was seized by rebels led by Michael Mallin and Countess Markievicz during the 1916 Easter Rising.

Keeping with the theme of ‘Nature and People’, the tours also explored the history of the RCSI Museum, and of a prized heritage collections, the RCSI History Specimen Collection, which holds an impressive collection of almost 200 zoological specimens. Visitors learned of the key events which have shaped not just the College's history, but Irish society, culture and politics over the past 230 years.

The tours ran at 11am, 2pm and 5pm daily. Guided tours were led by Head Porter, Frank Donegan and RCSI Front of House Manager, Bryan Sheils and lasted approximately one hour each.

National Heritage Week is organised by the Heritage Council and runs from 19 to 27 August.

RCSI is ranked in the top 250 institutions worldwide and joint 1st place in the Republic of Ireland in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings (2016-2017). It is an international not-for-profit health sciences institution, with its headquarters in Dublin, focused on education and research to drive improvements in human health worldwide.