Academic biography

Anne Marie Kavanagh (PhD, FHEA) teaches and researches in the areas of intercultural education, ethical education, social justice education, anti-racism education, climate justice education, and human rights education. 

A former primary teacher, she has worked extensively with undergraduate and postgraduate students, and in-service teachers, principals, and Special Needs Assistants for over two decades.

Recognised nationally and internationally for her expertise in critical and values-based education approaches, she is committed to producing justice-oriented frontier research with socially and pedagogically transformative potential.

Anne Marie's research excellence, leadership skills and sustained publishing record have been repeatedly recognised. Earlier in 2025, the team she was leading were awarded the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment funded ‘Literature Review on Intercultural Education’. This significant and impactful review will inform the development of new Intercultural Education Guidelines for education contexts across the continuum.

Since 2024, she has been collaborating with partners at Newcastle University and Northumbria University, and with her DCU colleague Prof Audrey Bryan, on a British Academy/Leverhulme-funded interdisciplinary project, ‘Classrooms for Climate Justice’. This project will advance knowledge in the under-researched area of climate justice education and has the potential to shape climate justice pedagogy in primary and post-primary schools.

Guided by a commitment to equity and epistemic justice, her research and teaching are progressively engaging with decolonising approaches. These approaches explore how knowledge production can be restructured to acknowledge and value diverse epistemologies and voices historically marginalised within the academy and school curricula. You can hear Anne Marie discuss how educators can decolonise the curriculum and promote social justice here and engage with a powerful interchange she curated focused on challenging academic extractivism and advancing relational research approaches here.

Over the last two decades, Anne Marie's pedagogical and curricular excellence have been recognised at multiple levels. As a student, she won the prestigious Vere Foster Medal (INTO, 2004) for achieving the highest grades in school placement a