I am a research fellow at the Centre for Teacher and Early Years Education (CTEY), UCL Institute of Education. Prior to this, I worked as a lecturer in children and family studies at the University of Portsmouth, UK from 2016-2019. I am a convenor for British Educational Research Association (BERA)’s Early Career Researcher Network, serve as an editorial board member for British Educational Research Journal (BERJ) and Journal of Childhood, Education & Society, and sit on the executive committee for Gender and Education Association (GEA) as membership lead. I am also an incoming editor for Children & Society Journal from January 2021. 

As a sociologist of education, gender and childhood, I have particular research interests in the influences of gender on young children’s experiences in early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings. My PhD project (2018) investigated how gender is embedded in the day-to-day interactions between practitioners and children, adopting a cross-cultural approach to engage with gender discourses in Scotland, Hong Kong, and Mainland China. 

So far, I have researched about topics such as gender balance and men in early childhood education, child agency, child-centred diversity and quality education, 0-3 curriculums, parenting, early reading, play-based pedagogy, and women in STEM. My research is cross-cultural and comparative, I have conducted projects in contexts such as the UK, China, Europe, Australia, and South Africa in collaboration with international researchers.