MU Department of Adult & Community Education welcomes Dr Katriona O’Sullivan

A warm welcome and best wishes to Dr Katriona O'Sullivan, who recently joined Maynooth University and the Department of Adult & Community Education

This PATH funded project aims to increase diversity in Initial Teacher Education in Ireland by offering a year-long preparation course to the most marginalised groups. Previously Katriona worked as coordinator of research and impact in the Trinity Access Programmes, and developed a significant body of work which evaluated the impact of programmes which attempt to raise the educational aspirations of underrepresented students and increase the capacity of teachers to develop teaching practices which match the 21st century workplace. Katriona has published her work in several international journals and is currently partnering with Oxford University’s Department of Education to research the impact that alternative access routes to higher education have students’ capability to participate. This project is funded by the Irish Research Council Research for Policy and Society grant, for which Katriona is the principal investigator.

Katriona herself is a graduate from the Trinity Access Programme; she completed a BA in Psychology in TCD in 2008 and a PhD in Psychology in 2012. She has held teaching positions in University City Dublin and Dublin Business School, lecturing in a range of Psychology and research method modules at undergraduate and postgraduate level and also taught on the Foundation Course in the Trinity Access Programmes for 8 years.