Full Professor
Dympna is a Full Professor of Education in UCD School of Education and Vice-Principal for Research, Innovation, and Impact in UCD College of Social Sciences and Law. Her specialist field is sociology, researching at the intersection of sociologies of education and sociologies of childhood, and the impact of education in society.
Current research includes leading two large-scale mixed methods longitudinal studies exploring children’s schooling experiences here in Ireland (Children’s School Lives) and in Sierra Leone (the Safe Learning Study). Both studies are unique and build on long-standing research into children’s everyday lives, focusing on their voices, rights, identities and equalities across home and school. This has included comparative international funded research by the EU, in addition to national studies funded by the Irish State, Irish Research Council and Non-Government Organisations, with over €5 million generated in research grant income. An additional current project, funded by the Norwegian Research Council, examines inter-generational learning and sustainability across coastal communities in five countries.
A former Fulbright scholar and Marie Curie Fellow, Dympna has published widely in the areas of migrant children in education, children’s rights and citizenship, pedagogies and school cultures for social justice and equality. She was a Ministerial nominee to the National Children’s Advisory Council and is an elected member of UCD Governing Authority.