Prof Emer Ring is Dean of Education, Early Childhood and Teacher Education at Mary Immaculate College, Limerick.  Emer leads and manages one of the largest education faculties in Ireland, which provides a wide range of programmes from early childhood to post-primary level at undergraduate and post-graduate levels. Emer’s previous experience includes Head of Department of Reflective Pedagogy and Early Childhood Studies, District and Senior Inspector with the Department of Education, teacher of children in children in the early years of primary school and special education teacher. Emer engages in a wide range of national and international research in education with a specific focus on education policy, child voice, pedagogy, autism, neuro-affirmative approaches, universal design for learning , curriculum development and inclusion. Emer also presents at conferences and seminars and publishes widely. Emer together with other colleagues led the design, development and evaluation of the multiple-award winning Leadership for INClusion in the Early Years (LINC) Programme.  Emer has recently been Country Analyst for the European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education in mapping policy and provision for the inclusion of children and young people with special educational needs across the education system. She has also supported the work of UNESCO with its publication in 2021 Inclusive Early Childhood Care and Education: From Commitment to Action and the work of the OECD in 2021 Strengthening Early Childhood Education and Care in Ireland: Review on Sector Quality.

Emer is co-editor of the Peter Lang publications Autism from the Inside Out: A Handbook for Parents, Early Childhood, Primary, Post-Primary and Special School Settings and Leading Inclusion from the Inside Out: A Handbook for Parents and Early Childhood Teachers in Early Learning and Care, Primary and Special School Settings. Emer has recently completed a publication Special Education in an Independent Ireland 1922-2022: Insights from a Journey Through the Century for the National Council for Special Education, an academic review paper focused on the review of the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act 2004 for the Department of Education and with her colleague Dr Lisha O’Sullivan, a paper on play, learning and teaching in a redeveloped primary curriculum framework for the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment. Emer was one of three expert advisors on the End-of-three-year Evaluation of the Access and Inclusion Model, a member of the Evaluation Oversight Committee for the Evaluation of the Better Start Quality Development Service and is a member of the Steering Committee for the multi-country project Fostering Inclusive Quality Education in Finland and Ireland. She is currently co-author with Dr Lisha O’Sullivan for the forthcoming publication Play from the Inside out: Theory, Research and Practice Perspectives due to be published by Peter Lang in early 2026.