ESD Team
Introducing the ESD Team
The Fellows, with well-established academic careers in their respective disciplines and with particular expertise and interest in ESD, work in partnership with the Centre for Academic Practice and Trinity Sustainability to lead the development of an ESD Strategy and Implementation Plan for Trinity.
ESD Team Members
Dr Claire McAvinia
Email: cmcavini@tcd.ie
Dr Claire McAvinia is an Academic Developer in the Centre for Academic Practice with more than 25 years' experience in academic development and digital education. In previous roles at TU Dublin, Maynooth University, and University College London, she contributed to a wide range of institutional and national teaching and learning projects.
Her research interests are in all aspects of academic professional development including ESD, open education, and post-digital learning spaces in higher education.
Dr Cuisle Forde
Email: c.forde@tcd.ie
Dr Cuisle Forde is an Associate Professor in Physiotherapy in the School of Medicine. Her research focuses on two key areas: exercise for individuals with chronic health conditions and the role of technology in medical education. She has worked with various patient populations to explore the relationship between exercise and health and leads a transdisciplinary research team examining the intersection of health and transport in the AI era.
Dr John Gallagher
Email: J.Gallagher@tcd.ie
Dr John Gallagher (@EnvDrJohnG) is an Assistant Professor in Environmental Systems Modelling from the Department of Civil, Structural & Environmental Engineering. John’s research expertise lies in the evaluation and development of passive engineering and nature-based solutions to improve environmental quality conditions in the built environment. His teaching focuses on pollution mitigation, and the life cycle and circularity design of engineering systems for undergraduate and postgraduate students.
Dr Jonathan Hodgers
Email:jhodgers@tcd.ie
Dr Jonathan Hodgers is a Teaching Fellow in Music. A specialist in popular music and culture, his work explores how music engages with themes of ethics, technology, and sustainability. He teaches across music history, film music, songwriting, AI, and modules such as Music and Climate, encouraging students to consider music’s role in cultural resilience and social change. His monograph Bob Dylan on Film: The Intersection of Music and Visuals was published by Routledge in 2024.
As an ESD Fellow, Jonathan contributes to the strategic integration of sustainability across Trinity’s curricula. With previous research experience in data-enabled student success and employability frameworks, he has a keen interest in how learning environments can support reflective, resilient, and socially engaged graduates.
Dr Cicely Roche
Email: rocheci@tcd.ie
Dr Cicely Roche is Associate Professor in the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences and is a Trinity Education Fellow/Academic Developer with the Centre for Academic Practice. Her key expertise is the design of curriculum to drive development of moral reasoning competencies, i.e. abilities underpinning decision-making through ambiguity in an ethically defensible manner. Her research also explores professional identity formation, ePortfolio for experiential learning, and developmental approaches to curriculum design in pharmacy-specific interprofessional and/or cross-institutional contexts. Her role with Academic Practice addresses staff development in Reflection and Programme focussed approaches to assessment.
Former ESD Fellow Members
Dr Sarah-Jane Cullinane
ESD Fellow Lead
Email: scullina@tcd.ie 
Dr Sarah-Jane Cullinane joined the ESD fellows from the Trinity Business School where her work has evolved through areas spanning from HRM, Organisational Behaviour and Wellbeing, to the Climate and Ecological Crises, developing transdiciplinary modules with colleagues along the way. As an experienced mindfulness teacher and facilitator, Sarah-Jane is particularly interested in creating supportive spaces for students and colleagues to explore their relationship with the natural world, to grieve for its unfolding destruction, and to cultivate their collective resilience and agency for deep transformation.
Dr Carlos Rocha
ESD Fellow
Email: rochac@tcd.ie
Dr Carlos Rocha (@OneBreathDoc) is an Associate Professor in Environmental Change at the School of Natural Sciences. After graduating in Technological Chemistry in 1991, he earned a PhD in Marine Sciences (Chemistry and Bioegochemistry) in 1997. Carlos studies how chemicals transported by water flow through the living earth and how they behave in transit in order to understand the plasticity of aquatic ecosystems to environmental and climate change. The outcomes of this research reveal the magnitudes, rates, and pathways to pollution of surface water, the pace of natural mitigation of contaminants in sedimentary environments and support better management of natural ecosystems. Currently, he teaches aspects of earth system science at undergraduate and postgraduate level and leads the Bioegochemistry Research Group at Trinity College.
Dr Felix
Mezzanotte
Email: felix.mezzanotte@tcd.ie
Dr Clare Kelly
Email: clare.kelly@tcd.ie