Qualifications/Background

I studied Psychology at QUB before completing a Master’s degree in Criminology. I worked in the voluntary sector as a social care worker with care experienced children, and in policy and research before graduating from DECAP as part of their fourth cohort in 2013.

I have since been working as an HCPC registered educational psychologist and I have been part of the DECAP team since September 2020.

In my role with the EA I have particular interest in working with specialist school settings; adolescents; and those children/young people who are seeking asylum or are refugee experienced.

I am one of two lead practitioners that were responsible for establishing a school-based support service for those seeking asylum or who are refugee experienced and where trauma presents as a significant concern. This service, the School’s Trauma Advisory and Referral Service (STARS), is a multidisciplinary and joint service between the EA Educational Psychology Service and the EA Intercultural Education Service.

DECAP Responsibilities and Teaching

I am the Year 2 tutor and co-ordinator for the DECAP Programme, and I take a lead role for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in the DECAP team. I am a member of the QUB School of Psychology Athena SWAN committee and the School’s Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion group.

Teaching areas include:

• Speech, language, and communication
• Motor development
• Understanding formulation
• Working with interpreters
• Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
• Introduction to Appreciative Inquiry

Research Interests

Research interests include:

• Asylum seeking and refugee experienced children, young people and families
• Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
• Psychological formulation, including cultural formulation practices
• Language and communication
• Working with interpreters
• Evidence based best practice, including evaluation of services
• Supporting those with significant learning needs - including moderate and severe learning needs
• Supporting those with experience of the care system - including children and young people, and those in their familial and professional networks
• Impact of trauma, and implications for education and on those experiencing SEN
• Power, privilege, and intersectionality and the roles they play in the lives of children, young people, and families
• Discourses and voices of under-represented, marginalised, or vulnerable groups
• Adolescence - including therapeutic approaches, issues of identity, and those attending alternative education provisions
• Working with and supporting families
• Systemic working/organisational change, including joint-, multi-, and inter-agency working
• Supervision including culturally responsive practice
• Improving culturally responsive practice, cultural humility, and multi-cultural competency
• The use of approaches such as Appreciative Inquiry in our interactions with others including during supervision, and in broaching topics that challenge us

I am currently supervising, or have recently supervised, the following projects:

• Self-Perceptions of Post-Primary Pupils with Moderate Learning Difficulties (MLD): A Qualitative Exploration of Specialist Education Settings
• Exploring the school experiences of adolescents on the autism spectrum with anxiety using participant-driven photo-elicitation (PDPE)
• An Exploration of Educational Psychologists' Experience Working with Children and Young People from Minority Cultural and Linguistic Communities in Northern Ireland
• Exploring Pupil and Caregiver Perspectives on Disordered Eating Support, Prevention, and Education within Schools: A Mixed-Methods Study
• Factors promoting job satisfaction of Classroom Assistants supporting children with Autism in mainstream primary and post-primary education in Northern Ireland
• 2023 Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion group project - Diversity, Culture and the Social Graces in Educational Psychology Practice
• 2022 Equality and Diversity group project - Responding to SEN in a time of coronavirus: A qualitative study of SENCo perceptions