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I am a Lecturer in Education in the School of Education at University College Cork. My teaching brief is currently focused on Inclusive/Special Education. I deliver modules on our Postgraduate Diploma in Special Educational Needs (PDSEN) as well as on other programmes across the school. My previous appointment within the school was with our B. Ed in Sports Studies and Physical Education (2014-2016). Prior to this, I taught English and SEN at second level for eighteen years. I spent fifteen years in Mayfield Community School(1999-2014) where I served as JCSP Co-ordinator, Year Head as well as taking a lead role in extra-curricular activities. I was a Learning Support/Resource teacher and co-ordinator whilst also working as an Associate for the Special Education Support Service (SESS). I bring this experience to bear in my roles here in the School of Education.

I lecture in Inclusive/Special Education, Pedagogy (English), Curriculum Design, Assessment, Psychosocial Aspects of Learning, Psychology of Education, Sociology of Education, Sociology of Sport and Research Methods. I qualified with a BA in English & History (1996), Postgraduate Diploma in Education (1997), Postgraduate Diploma in Learning Support (2003), Masters in Education (2005) and PhD in Education (2012).

The focus of my PhD study was an ethnographic study on the interplay between social class, school choice and student identity. My research interests lie in the areas of student identity and social class, adolescent literacy development and inclusive/special education.

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Research Interests

Education and Inequality
Social Class and Education
Literacy and Identity
English and Digital Literacies
Inclusive Education

A primary area of focus for my research is (in)equality in Education. This is the focus of my PhD study which focused upon intersections between social class, school choice and student identity. it has sparked some of my current research and writing. There are peer-reviewed papers forthcoming as a result of this research.


Abstract

This thesis is a critical ethnographic study of school choice and social class in the context of an Irish urban post-primary school. It is set in Portown, a suburb of an Irish city. The study aspires to explore the sociocultural co-construction of student identities in a world mediated by classed positioning, power oriented inscriptions and neo-liberal discourses of success and sameness.

 An emergent and recurrent theme of this study is the (mis)representation of working class spaces and most particularly working class schools and students. This study discusses both the internal and external co-constitutive nature of classed identities, the centrality of stratification by social class in an increasingly vigorous education marketplace, some inconsistencies in the policy field and some implications for future policy emerging from this study.

The ethnography is centred on the school and the student participants, however, it does veer into the community and wider society as the strands that emerge need untangling from wider social, cultural, political, historical and economic contexts. The thematic findings of the study focus on the key areas of identity, social class and school choice processes.

The world of the school and its students are shrouded in discourses of equality of opportunity, sameness, difference, self-development and social mobility. This study also serves to critically explore the mediating work of such discourses in the life-world of the school. It also considers the self-authoring practices of students and their constructions of place are simultaneously grappling with the mediated actions of these discourses.

This study is, most importantly, an exercise in social critique that intends to serve the greater good of equality in education and in the wider spheres of community and society.

ALIAS

I also maintain a strong interest in identity, schooling and literacies. I co-collaborate on a current project with Dr Dan O' Sullivan, Dr Alicia Curtin and Professor Kathy Hall. This project Adolescent Literacy, Identity and School (ALIAS), is working towards an interrogation of how literacy practices and identity intersect with one another in school contexts. The study, funded by the Strategic Research Fund here in UCC also hopes to design and implement a literacy intervention for targeted first year students in post-primary schools.

ITE4I

Since 2015, I have been working as part of a research team on the Initial Teacher Education for Inclusion (ITE4I) project in collaboration with Manchester Metropolitan University and University College London. This is a large project funded by the National Council for Special Education which is interrogating aspects of inclusive education in initial teacher education.

Research Grants

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Peer Reviewed Journals

	Year	Publication
	(2017)	'Socio-sartorial inscriptions of social class in a study of school and identity in Ireland' Cahill, K. (2017) 'Socio-sartorial inscriptions of social class in a study of school and identity in Ireland'. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, :1-12 [DOI] [Details]
	(2016)	'Psycho-spatial disidentification and class fractions in a study of social class and identity in an urban post-primary school community in Ireland' Cahill, K. (2016) 'Psycho-spatial disidentification and class fractions in a study of social class and identity in an urban post-primary school community in Ireland'. Research Papers in Education, :1-15 [DOI] [Details]
	(2015)	'Seeing the wood from the trees: A critical policy analysis of intersections between social class inequality and education in twenty-first century Ireland' Cahill,K. (2015) 'Seeing the wood from the trees: A critical policy analysis of intersections between social class inequality and education in twenty-first century Ireland'. International Electronic Journal of Elementary Education, 8 (2):301-316 [Details]
	(2014)	'Choosing schools: Explorations in post-primary school choice in an urban Irish working class community' Cahill, K. and Hall.K. (2014) 'Choosing schools: Explorations in post-primary school choice in an urban Irish working class community'. Irish Educational Studies, 33 (4):383-397 [DOI] [CORA Link] [Details]

Conference Publications

Other Journals

Thesis/Dissertation

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Teaching Interests

I teach on the following modules across the Postgraduate Diploma in Special Educational Needs, Professional Master of Education, Masters in Education (modular)and the Master of Arts in Applied Psychology & Guidance Counselling.

PDSEN

M.Ed.(Modular)

ED6035 Dissertation in Education

ED6039 The Inclusion of Pupils with Special Educational Needs: Opportunities, Challenges, Dilemmas

ED6059: Intersections of Identity and Practice in Inclusive and Special Education

PME Modules

ED6331 School Placement: Research and Professional Experiences Portfolio A

ED6332 School Placement: Research and Professional Experience Portfolio B

ED6347 The Teaching of English 2

MAAPGC

ED6214 Inclusion and Learning for Students with Special Educational Needs: Identity & Disability

Recent Postgraduates

Current Postgraduate Students

Modules Taught

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Internal Collaborators

External Collaborators