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Curriculum

Erika Marie PACE Curriculum

Erika Marie Pace is an Associate Professor in “General Didactics and Special Pedagogy” (S.S.D. M-PED/03) at the Department of Humanities, Philosophy, and Education at the University of Salerno.

In 2002, she graduated with honours from the University of Malta with a Bachelor of Education (Hons) in Home Economics and Early Childhood Education. After several years of teaching in secondary schools, she furthered her studies at the University of Perugia, where she earned a Master’s degree in Health Promotion and Health Education. In 2014, she graduated with honours in Professional Educators and Experts in Continuing Education at the University of Salerno, and in 2017, she obtained a Ph.D. in “Didactic Corporeality, Technologies, and Inclusion.”

On June 9, 2023, she received the National Scientific Qualification as a Full Professor in the Sector 11/D2 “Didactics, Special Pedagogy, and Educational Research.” In 2019 she won the Italian Pedagogy Award from the Italian Society of Pedagogy (SIPED) with her monograph "Instilling teachers’ willingness to foster inclusive classroom practices. Can simplexity address this complexity?" (Pace, E. M., 2017, San Cesario di Lecce, Pensa Editore).

From 2008 to 2009, she was a contracted researcher for the Non-Governmental Organisation ‘Home Economists in Action’ in the European research project “Development of Online Consumer Education Tools for Adults (DOLCETA),” funded by the Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Protection (DGSANCO). In 2010, she won a research contract at the Department of Medical-Surgical Specialties and Public Health at the University of Perugia and participated as a component of Work Package 3 in the European research project “Developing Competencies and Professional Standards for Health Promotion Capacity Building in Europe (CompHP)” (Project Number 20081209), funded by the European Union and lasting three years. Since 2014, she has participated as a team member in various research projects funded by the University of Salerno. From November 2015 to November 2017, she was a Research Fellow at the Department of Humanitieis, Philosophy and Education with a project titled “Teaching Innovation to Combat Out-of-school Students with Special Needs through the Use of Trans-Professional Aids” (SSD: M-PED/03). Since 2018, she has been the scientific responsible of research projects locally funded by the University of Salerno.

From February 2019 to July 2022, she was part of the research group of the three-year project “Second Star to the Right, This is the Way - Mentors for Resilience,” with Oxfam Italy as the responsible entity. Since the 2007/2008 academic year, she has been a visiting guest lecturer at the University of Malta in the BSc Home Economics degree course, and from 2019/2020 to 2021/2022, she taught in the Masters in Teaching and Learning – Home Economics course. From 2013 to 2022, she was a Cambridge ESOL Speaking Examiner at Cambridge Assessment English, University of Cambridge.

Since the 2018/2019 academic year, she has held different courses at undergraduate, post-graduate and PhD levels in the following areas:

Research Methodology in Education

Special Pedagogy and Didactics

Educational Design and Differentiated Instruction

International Perspectives on Educational Guidance in Education

Special Education for wellbeing

Quality of life and life plan: from planning to evaluation

Inclusive Didactics and Pedagogy

Since May 2022, she has been a member of the Academic Board of the Doctoral School in Human Sciences and Cultures. Society, Education, Politics, and Communication - SCU XXXVIII cycle - Curriculum C, Educational Research Methodology. Since April 2023, she has been a member of the Academic Board of the Doctoral School in “Educational and Social Research. Society and Teaching-learning Studies” (XXXIX Cycle) - Curriculum A, Didactics, Special Pedagogy, and Technology for Inclusive Education at the Department of Political and Social Studies (DISPS).

Since January 2024, she has been the DISUFF Delegate for the NEOLAiA - European University Alliance project. Since 2023 she is also DISUFF Delegate for International Mobility.

Since 2018, she has been an ordinary member of the Italian Society of Special Pedagogy (SIPeS), the Italian Society of Pedagogy (SIPED), and the Italian Society for Educational Research (SIRD), and since 2019, she has been an ordinary member of the Italian Society for Media Education Research (SIREM). Internationally, since 2017, she has been a member of the “Consortium of Inclusive Teacher Education and Development,” chaired by prof. Umesh Sharma of Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. The consortium, of international significance, consists of 17 members from various countries and focuses on teacher training to promote inclusive educational processes. Since 2012, she has participated in numerous international conferences as a speaker, and since 2018, she has been a chair and abstract reviewer at European conferences organized by the European Educational Research Association (EERA).

In her early years, her scientific interests focused particularly on teacher training and effective approaches to promoting a more inclusive educational system. Specifically, she participated in international studies on the variables influencing teachers’ decision-making to adopt inclusive teaching strategies, and the benefits and potential of reflective thinking in teacher training. More recently, her research has focused on asset-based approaches in educational research and community development, interprofessional and interdisciplinary education, and mentoring in higher education settings.

The following is a list of her most recent publications:

  1. Pace, E. M., Di Paolo, A., Zollo, I., Aiello, P., Sibilio, M. (2024). Formarsi e formare l’altro da sé: la terza missione come veicolo per arginare la povertà educativa. Education Sciences & Society, 1, 114-133.
  2. Pace, E. M., Zollo, I., Sibilio, M. (2023). The Rise, Evolution, and Future of Didactics in Italy: Branching Out Towards New Research Horizons. In F. Ligozat K. Klette J. Almqvist (Eds.), Didactics in a Changing World. European Perspectives on Teaching, Learning and the Curriculum. Transdisciplinary Perspectives in Educational Research (pp. 67-80), Springer, ISBN: 978-3-031-20810-2, ISSN: 2662-6691.
  3. Aiello, P., Di Gennaro, D. C., Pace, E. M., Zappala, E., & Capodanno, F. (2023). Shifting from the Discrete to the Continuum: How Are Italian Universities Facing the Challenge? In Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction (pp. 173-189), Cham: Springer, Copenhagen, 23-28 Luglio, doi: 10.1007/978-3-031-35897-5_13.
  4. Aiello, P., Pace, E. M., Sharma, U., Rangarajan, R., Sokal, L., May, F., Gonzalez Gil, F., Loreman, T., Malak, S., Martín, E., McIlroy, A., & Schwab, S. (2023). Identifying teachers’ strengths to face COVID-19: narratives from across the globe. In Cambridge Journal of Education, pp. 1-18, ISSN: 1469-3577, doi: 10.1080/0305764X.2022.2159013.
  5. Pace, E. M., & Aiello, P. (2022). Interventi comunitari strengths-¬based per promuovere l’inclusione per il benessere: alla (ri)scoperta delle risorse individuali e collettive. Italian Journal of Special Education for Inclusion, vol. X, pp. 161-168,
  6. Pace, E. M., Viola, I., Di Nocera, A. M., & Aiello, P. (2021). “Riflessività e ricerca nella formazione ibrida dei futuri docenti di sostegno.” In Lifelong Lifewide Learning (LLL), 17(39), pp. 23-33.
  7. Aiello, P., Pace, E. M., & Sibilio, M. (2021). “A simplex approach in Italian teacher education programmes to promote inclusive practices.” In International Journal of Inclusive Education, pp. 1-14, doi: 10.1080/13603116.2021.1882056. ISSN: 1360-3116.
  8. Pace, E. M. & Sibilio, M. (2020). “Un approccio salutogenico per promuovere l’incremento di inclusione nelle scuole”. In R. Caldin (a cura di) Ricerca, scenari, emergenza sull'inclusione (II Tomo - Sezione SIPeS), pp. 210-217. Lecce: Pensa MultiMedia. ISBN: 9788867607082.
  9. Aiello, P. Pace, E.M. (2020). “Inclusive educational principles, policies, and practices in Italy”. In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. Oxford University Press. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.1282.
  10. Sharma, U. & Pace, E. M. (2019). “Teachers’ commitment to teach in inclusive schools, preparation of”. In M. A. Peters (a cura di), Encyclopedia of teacher education, 1-6. Springer Link. Doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-1179-6_41-1.
  11. Pace, E. M. & Aiello, P. (2018). “Facing the complexity of inclusive classrooms through reflection on simplex principles”. In G. Caruth & M. Ticusan (a cura di), Current issues in educational methods and theory in changing world, pp. 3-18. Athens: Athens Institute for Education and Research. ISBN: 978-960-598-209-06.