Personal statement
I am currently working at the School of Education as a Chancellor’s Fellow. My research interests include inclusive education, children and young people' voices and participation, sustainable development and technology. I completed my PhD research ‘Imagining Inclusive Schooling’ at Moray House School of Education, University of Edinburgh, which explored the experiences of disabled children and their teachers in Chinese mainstream schools through an ethnographic approach. Following that, I was awarded the ESRC GCRF Postdoctoral Fellowship ‘Counting Every Child In’ to engage key stakeholders to promote disabled children’s access to inclusive and quality education in China. Before joining Strathclyde, I worked as a Research Associate at the Centre for Research in Digital Education and developed funded projects to critically examine the relationships between inclusive education and technologies. One of the projects resulted in the publishing of a co-edited book ‘Artificial intelligence and inclusive education: speculative futures and emerging practices’, which won the 2020 Springer Nature New China Development award and is now being translated into Arabic. Recently, I led a NERC 'discipline hopping' networking project and established Strathclyde's Children and Young People Sustainablity Network. I was also a core member of the writing group which produced the 3rd version of Scotland's 'National Framework for Inclusion'.
I am the course co-coordinator for PGCert Inclusive Education (GTCS professional recognition certificate: Additional Support Needs 3-18) and the module co-leader of Inclusive Pedagogy. I regularly deliver professional development programmes for practitioners to build their capacity in inclusive practice. I am also a member of committees and groups including the Scottish Universities Inclusion Group, School of Education’s Global Engagement working group and the Strathclyde Early Years Hub.
I welcome prospective students who are interested in inclusion and diversity issues, international perspectives of inclusive educational development and student/child-led approaches to get in touch regarding supervision opportunities. Below is a list of some completed and on-going projects supervised by colleagues and myself in Strathclyde:
Maggie MacAskill. EdD. What agency do students with Complex Additional Support Needs have in educational subject choice and what are the factors that determine this?
Xunrou Shen. PhD. Rethinking Parental Engagement under the Covid-19 crisis through a Froebelian lens: Bringing Young Children’s Voices to the Front.
Rosie Campbell. EdD. Pupils' experiences of the GIRFEC approach in Scotland.
Kerrie Highcock. EdD. Autistic children's views of support in England.
Jingyi Yang. PhD. Exploring culturally sustaining pedagogy in Scottish early childhood education.
Jennifer McNicol. EdD. Places of belonging for care experienced learners.
Roseann Maguire. PhD. Disabled children and young people’s understanding of participation in home and school environments.
Research interests
- Inclusion and diversity in education
- Student voice
- Sustainable development
- Technology
- Research engagement and impact
Professional activities
- Frontiers in Education (Journal)
- Peer reviewer
- 4/2023
- EIS workshop: ASN and Inclusive Education
- Consultant
- 3/2023
- Here and now: co-creating everyday possibilities for the inclusion of every child (EIS Inclusive Education event)
- Consultant
- 3/2023
- Making a difference in and through inclusive education
- Speaker
- 2023
- Feeling and negotiating relational complexity in an ethnographic inquiry with disabled children in Chinese mainstream schools
- Speaker
- 11/2022
- Negotiating relational complexity in school-based ethnographic childhood research in China through the lens of emotional reflexivity
- Speaker
- 9/2022
More professional activities
Projects
- Tackling ethical challenges in research with children: contextualising children’s rights in China
- Wang, Yuchen (Co-investigator) Zhu, Yan (Principal Investigator) Xu, Yuwei (Co-investigator) Gao, Jie (Co-investigator) Qu, Xiao (Co-investigator) Wu, Xiaoling (Co-investigator) Deng, Meng (Co-investigator) Xu, Shan (Co-investigator)
- A knowledge exchange seminar series to promote discussions amongst researchers to understand how children’s rights are constructed and understood in the context of China and reflect on ethical challenges in research with children. Funded by UCL Global Engagement Funds (£5,000).
- 01-Jan-2023 - 31-Jan-2023
- International Strategic Partnership Fund
- Wang, Yuchen (Principal Investigator)
- The project is to build research partnership with the Institute for Accessibility Development in Tsinghua University.
- 01-Jan-2022 - 31-Jan-2023
- Strathclyde Research Intern
- Wang, Yuchen (Principal Investigator)
- Supervisor of student project 'The Question of How: A Literature-based Exploration of Good Practice in Engaging Children in Environmental Sustainability Research'
- 06-Jan-2022 - 01-Jan-2022
- Co-creating transdisciplinary environmental solutions with children and young people
- Wang, Yuchen (Principal Investigator) Davis, John (Co-investigator) Mevawalla, Zinnia (Co-investigator) Martinez-Lejarreta, Loreain (Researcher) Ross, Kirsty (Co-investigator) Somorin, Tosin (Co-investigator) Lennon, Marilyn (Co-investigator) Liggat, John (Co-investigator) Mckendry, Stephanie (Co-investigator) Mitchell, Richard (Co-investigator) Smithx, Cowboy (Co-investigator) Cairns, Liam (Co-investigator) Phillips, Alexandra Lort (Co-investigator) McGroarty, John Paul (Co-investigator) Walters, Hannah (Co-investigator)
- The project aims to develop an interest group through snowballing to establish an internal network and shape the vision and framework of a Strathclyde-based Hub on children and young people's leadership role in sustainable environmental solutions. The intended outcomes are: extended transdisciplinary networks to enable Strathclyde-led research, KE and CDTs development; increased capacity in Strathclyde’s community on working with children and young people as agents of change.
- 03-Jan-2022 - 31-Jan-2022
- Artificial intelligence and inclusive education
- Wang, Yuchen (Co-investigator)
- Advanced Innovation Centre for Future Education, Beijing Normal University.(£22,899)
- 01-Jan-2018 - 01-Jan-2019
- Lecture recording and inclusive practice in higher education
- Wang, Yuchen (Co-investigator) Knox, Jeremy (Principal Investigator)
- Principal's Teaching Award Scheme, University of Edinburgh. (£14,397)
- 26-Jan-2018 - 31-Jan-2019
More projects