Welcome to my website and thanks for your interest in my work. I'm doing my best to keep information up to date, but it's not easy, so please bear with me!
If you are looking for a copy of one of my publications, feel free to send me an email, ideally via my address at the University of Edinburgh, which you can find here. Another option is to identify the publication on ResearchGate and send me a request there.
I am Professor of Public Education in the Centre for Public Education and Pedagogy, Maynooth University, Ireland, and Professor of Educational Theory and Pedagogy at the Moray House School of Education and Sport, University of Edinburgh, UK. From January 2023 onwards I have started a four-year term as member of the Education Council of the Netherlands (Onderwijsraad), the advisory body of the Dutch government and parliament on educational matters.
I often wonder whether the work I do is of any significance. That's ultimately a judgement for those who read and use my work. In terms of statistics, if they matter, I can say that my work is visible internationally and attracts a significant number of citations. Google scholar lists a total number of citations of about 60,000 (April 2024), of which over 32,000 since 2019. An analysis published by research.com in 2023 ranked me 29 in the Social Sciences and Humanities in the UK making me, as far as I can see, the most cited education scholar in the list, and 186 worldwide, putting me in the top 10 of education scholars worldwide.
I am co-editor of the Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, and associate editor of Educational Theory, and have recently concluded a six-year term as co-editor of the British Educational Research Journal. I co-edit two book series with Routledge: Theorizing Education (with Stefano Oliverio), and New Directions in the Philosophy of Education (with Michael A. Peters, Liz Jackson and Marek Tesar).
I have a PhD from Leiden University the Netherlands (1992), a degree in Education from Leiden University (1987) and a degree in Philosophy from Erasmus University Rotterdam (1989). I am a former Spencer Post-Doctoral Fellow with the National Academy of Education, USA, and have received Honorary Doctorates from Uppsala University, Sweden; Örebro University, Sweden; and the University of Oulu, Finland.
I have worked at Universities in Luxembourg, Scotland (University of Stirling), England (University of Exeter; Brunel University London), and the Netherlands (in Utrecht, Leiden and Groningen) and have held Visiting Professorships at NLA University College, Norway; Örebro University, Sweden; Mälardalen University, Sweden; and ArtEZ Institute of the Arts, the Netherlands.
From 2015 until 2018 I was an associate member of the 'Onderwijsraad' (the Education Council of the Netherlands), the main government advisory body on education. Since April 2016 I am a scientific advisor of Verus, the Association for Catholic and Christian education in the Netherlands. From 2020 until 2022 I was an appointed by member of the Scientific Curriculum Committee which is tasked with providing advise about the final stages of the reform of the national frameworks for the curriculum for primary and secondary education.
From 2020 - 2023 I was deputy head of the Institute for Education, Teaching and Leadership at the University of Edinburgh. In the past years I have held Visiting Professorships at the University of Agder, Norway and at Uniarts, the University of the Arts, Helsinki, Finland.
please note
* Please note that I do not work during weekends, so if you sent an e-mail on Saturday or Sunday, it is likely that it will not arrive. Please resend your message during weekdays. Due to the very large number of e-mails I receive, I am not able to reply to all messages. Thanks for your understanding.
