Professor Emma Wainwright
Professor
Summary
Emma is a Professor and interdisciplinary social scientist with a background in Human Geography. She is co-lead of the Human Geography: Space, Place and Society research group (with Nicola Ansell and Monica Degen) and the Education, Identities and Society research group (with Utsa Mukherjee). Emma studied Geography at the University of Aberdeen and, after completing her PGCE (Secondary) at the University of Edinburgh and a brief period of secondary teaching, was awarded a scholarship by the University of St Andrews to undertake her PhD in Social and Historical Geography. Prior to working at Brunel, Emma was a Research Executive in the Social Research Institute at MORI (now Ipsos MORI).
Emma's research interests focus on the geographies of education, training and welfare, and social and educational inequalities. In particular her works explores higher education and student experience; social housing and resident engagement; family, parenting and home-school engagement; embodiment, body work and emotional labour. Emma's work engages low-income, marginalised and 'hard to reach' groups.
Research has been funded through external grants awarded by the ESRC, the British Academy, the City of London Corporation, Barclays, the Froebel Trust, the Learning and Skills Council, and the Money Advice Service. Emma has successfully collaborated with various social housing providers across London and the South East including A2Dominion, Catalyst and East Thames (now L&Q) to deliver research and evaluation projects. The impact of this research was captured in a REF 21 case study.
For six years, Emma was editor of the British Educational Research Journal (Jan 2018- Dec 2023). She has recently been external examiner at the University of Hertfordshire (BSc Geography), University of Newcastle (BSc Geography) and Cardiff University (MSc Education and MSc Childhood and Youth), and acts as a regular reviewer for various academic journals. In 2006 Emma was awarded the Newbigin Prize by the Royal Scottish Geographical Society for her paper published in the Scottish Geographical Journal. Recent work has been published in Area, Educational Review, Education 3-13 and Population, Space and Place.
Emma has worked at Brunel for 20 years, nine years as part time. She currently works 4-days a week (Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday).
Qualifications
PhD, Geography, University of St Andrews
PGC in Higher Education, Brunel University London
PGC in Secondary Education (Geography and Modern Studies), Moray House, University of Edinburgh
MA (Hons) Geography (1st Class), University of Aberdeen
Awards and Prizes
BERA Conference Award for Best Paper in the Educational Policy and Educational Research SIG, 2023
BERA Conference Commendation for Best Paper in the Alternative Education SIG, 2021
Brunel Teach Award for Innovative Assessment, 2018
University's Student-Led Teaching Award for Outstanding Feedback, 2017
Royal Scottish Geographical Society, Newbigin Prize, 2006
Responsibility
Internal:
Co-lead Education, Identities and Society research group (2024-)
Co-lead Human Geography: Space, Place and Society research group (2022- )
ESRC Grand Union Doctoral Training Programme lead for Education (2023- )
Department REF 2021 and 2029 review panels
Senior Tutor (2017-2021)
Programme Co-Lead BA Education (2019-2021)
Chair of EC panel and SEC meetings (2017-2021)
Member of Department Management Board (2017-2021)
Member of University's British Academy review panel
Director of Centre for Human Geography (until 2015)
Research Lead, Division of Social Work (2014-16)
External:
ESRC Peer Review College member (2010- )
Editorial Board: British Educational Research Journal (2024- )
Mentor: Geographies of Children, Young People and Families Research Group (RGS-IBG) (2024- )
Co-Editor: British Educational Research Journal (2018-2023)
External Examiner, MSc Education, Policy and Society and MSc Childhood and Youth, Cardiff University (2018- 2022)
External Examiner, BA/BSc Geography, University of Hertfordshire (2018-2022)
External Examiner, BA Geography, Newcastle University (2014-2018)
Committee Member: Geographies of Children, Young People and Families Research Group (RGS-IBG)
Newest selected publications
Wainwright, E., McHugh, E. and Chappell, A. (2025) 'Journeying through in-between times and spaces: commuter students’ everyday practices of and strategies for university access and engagement', in Kraftl, P., Chen, Y., Holloway, S. and Kučerová, SR. (eds.) Handbook on Geographies of Education. Cheltenham : Edward Elgar Publishing.Open Access Link
Smith, R., Mansfield, L. and Wainwright, E. (2025) 'Making sense of youth-led social action with, and for, young people from refugee backgrounds'. Leisure Studies. pp. 1 - 15. ISSN: 0261-4367
Hoskins, K., Wainwright, E., Mukherjee, U., Xu, Y. and Lebbakhar, A. (2024) 'The potential of Froebelian philosophy to support and engage low-income families in the early years'. Place of publication: Froebel Trust. Available at: https://www.froebel.org.uk/research-library/the-potential-of-froebelian-philosophy-to-support-and-engage-low-income-families-in-the-early-years.Open Access Link
Hoskins, K., Wainwright, E., Arabaci, R., Zhai, J., Gao, J. and Xu, Y. (2024) 'Engaging low-income families in education research: examining the challenges in Beijing and London'. Compare: a journal of comparative and international education, 0 (ahead of print). pp. 1 - 19. ISSN: 0305-7925 Open Access Link
Wainwright, E., Hoskins, K., Arabaci, R., Zhai, J., Gao, J. and Xu, Y. (2024) 'Researching the Everyday Educational Lives of Low-Income Families: The Importance of Researcher and Participant Contexts'. British Journal of Educational Studies, 73 (1). pp. 5 - 25. ISSN: 0007-1005 Open Access Link