The orientation of collective care is barely present and not structurally implemented within the current academic system (Longley et al. 2021), generating a lack of acknowledgement towards common vulnerabilities (The Care Collective 2020) and psychological disorders (Evans et al. 2018). Injecting feminist ethics of care into academia seems to be a necessary means to resist the individualistic logic of neoliberal pressures (Mountz et al. 2015) and re-politicize academic life (Bozalek 2017). Recently, Bali and Zamora (2022) elaborated on the idea of socially just care, built on the parity of participation (Fraser 2005), meaning that the care responsibility is distributed among all members of a community.

Equal power can also come from accessibility measures that abled and privileged academics might conceive as dispreferred, such as digital tools and online gatherings. Online forms of care can be even more effective alternatives than offline care relationships, offering safe, horizontal and inclusive spaces (Byron 2020; The Collective Care 2020; Prandini and Ganugi 2022).

Building on this reflection, we analyse two experiential and creative academic practices – DiverGente (Divergent, also interpretable as DiverPeople in Italian) and Accademia Innovativa (Innovative Academia) – which we have created in the last two years to inhabit the academic world differently. In particular, we seek answers to the following research questions: to what extent do these experiences develop a socially just care? How does the digital dimension favour or hinder the formation of a socially just care?

Both projects stand as attempts at opening academic tools and knowledge to a wider group of stakeholders, through unconventional, more accessible, and slower dynamics. They both entail an intentional effort to translate academic knowledge into terms that can be easily comprehended and used by the wider community, disseminating scholarship, creating communities where people can have a voice, and contributing to collective care by sharing knowledge and practices that can be reproduced elsewhere. The digital location of these “places” makes them cheaper to be maintained, potentially open to anonymized participation, and safer for early career researchers fearing repercussions for their thoughts, neurodivergent and disabled people who are not comfortable with sensory and compulsory social elements of in-person meetings, and queer people who are closeted at their institutions or left them for reasons related to accessibility and stigma.

We recognize that these practices came out of an individual’s mind and can still be conceived of as an individual’s digital place hosting the community. Nevertheless, said communities co-create themselves by setting the agenda and contributing to the very nature of these spaces, impacting on one another’s views and actions, caring for one another, and, possibly, caring for others outside these spaces. Eventually, both cases represent the result of two early-career and not-tenured researchers’ willingness to resist the norm of fast and individual-focused academia, by claiming the existence of alternative and slow working conditions, despite their precariousness. Thus, we conclude that these alternative academic platforms can trigger a culture of “caring with” (Tronto 2013), fostering the shift towards socially just care in academic scholarship.

The training of faculty members in inclusive education and Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is an essential factor in achieving an equitable university (Hsiao et al., 2019). However, they often show a lack of knowledge necessary to address diversity, which is a major barrier to learning for students with disabilities (Doménech et al., 2023).

In this study, a training program in inclusive education and ULD was implemented with the participation of 20 faculty members from different areas of knowledge of a public university. The training was developed in Blended-Learning mode for 6 months, combining face-to-face sessions with online learning. The development of the program was evaluated at three points in time: at the beginning, during the training, and at the end. Three months later, two participants from the areas of Education and Physiotherapy were selected to evaluate the impact of the training on their teaching and the learning of their students. For the data collection, observations were made in class sessions, analysis of the design of the teaching projects, and group interviews with 5 students from Education and 8 from Physiotherapy. The interviews were conducted at the end of the course, to allow the students to evaluate the performance of their faculty members and the impact on their learning. These data were analyzed inductively through a system of categories and codes using the MaxQDA12 program.

The teaching-learning process evaluated complied with the three UDL principles. The use of a variety of formats (oral discourse, texts, presentations, audiovisual material, digital material, gesticulation, etc.) allowed students to receive the information in different ways, ensuring access to and understanding of the information by all (principle 1). In addition, all the materials used complied with the principles of accessibility. On the other hand, the evaluation, activities, and tasks were negotiated with the students. Different evaluation modalities were offered and freedom was given for each one to choose the format and support to carry out projects and activities (principle 2). Finally, different active and participatory teaching methods were applied in addition to the master class, such as guided discussion, cooperative learning or case studies. For the students, these methods were not usual at the university, and they stated that they felt more motivated and predisposed to participate and work, both inside and outside the classroom (principle 3).

The results of this study lead to the conclusion that training in universal design improves the skills and knowledge of faculty members to adequately address diversity, allowing them to reformulate their designs and develop more flexible teaching. At the same time, it also shows that students value teaching based on UDL principles positively, stating that it breaks down barriers, increases motivation levels, and improves the learning experience.

In the Italian university system, the gap between research and teaching is significant (Felisatti, 2011). Research activity is intrinsically recognized as a primary requirement in the academic context, playing an indispensable role in both access to the profession and career development. In this context, research skills are provided through specific, long-term training courses that are supported by scientific communities and institutions. Research is systematically conducted in collaboration with others, and the results of this research are presented, compared, and widely discussed in national and international circles. On the other hand, the reality is different concerning the teaching aspect. In this regard, this contribution aims to outline the historical evolution and multidisciplinary areas of Faculty Development, examining the activities aimed at mitigating the existing gap between research and teaching, through an enhancement of the teaching skills of university lecturers. The intention is, therefore, to reflect on the current state of universities, on new models and perspectives in an attempt to reinforce and promote attitudes and beliefs relating to various aspects of the role of the university lecturer. In particular, it is intended to raise awareness of Faculty development activities; and to establish an ongoing reflection and reconsideration of teaching strategies, to give greater centrality to student learning.

The paper aims to study the precarious researchers' approaches to international mobility, the meanings that the imperative of internationalization takes on in the narratives of men and women in academia, and the inequalities that this imperative contributes to produce. The main question is whether opportunity structures for mobility are unequally distributed among different social groups within Italian academia and how they translate into different strategies and perspectives.

The early career stage is crucial for the academic career. How the early careers are socialized into the profession significantly impacts their future in academia. Early careers face distinct challenges compared to advanced academics, such as extremely high competition, precariousness, fewer permanent positions, and difficulties in planning and balancing family and career. Additionally, this career is usually expected to be international, at least in part.

Internationalization is one of the pillars of academic excellence, considered an essential component of scientific productivity, and it has become increasingly relevant for the academic career (Ackers, 2008; van der Bink & Benschop, 2012), especially for obtaining a tenured position (Herschberg et al., 2018). Mobility is one of the key mechanisms through which internationalization occurs and is considered a source of opportunities for enhancing academic skills, academic knowledge, and competencies (Teichler 2006).

However, recently, some scholars have highlighted how the strong accent on international mobility in academic evaluation can have various implications on the biographies of individuals. These studies, starting from the evidence of the different mobility rates of men and women, especially in some countries and in the early stages (European Commission 2019), focus on how the overlapping of the precarious conditions of work and the mobility imperative can generate a structural source of vulnerability which impacts women and men differently (Morley et al., 2018; Sautier 2021; Tzanakou & Henderson, 2021; Zippel, 2017), contributing to create and perpetuate conditions of inclusion-exclusion based on social and individual characteristics, such as gender, economic conditions, marital status, nationality etc.

Our paper looks at how international mobility has become an imperative for academic careers in Italy and how early-stage researchers cope with it. We examine narratives about the international experiences – lived, missed or planned – of men and women early-career researchers with a triple intent: 1) to investigate the conditions that favour or, on the contrary, hinder international mobility, also look at individual strategies for responding to or resisting this imperative in the neoliberal academia; 2) to investigate the expectations and the perceived results of researchers involved in international mobility and their academic perspectives; 3) to reconnect individual strategies and perspectives to the two coexisting academic cultures, cooptative or meritocratic.

In order to pursue these research aims, we conduct a content analysis on 64 semi-structured interviews with early-career researchers in the STEM and SSH departments. The interviews are part of the broader research project of relevant national interest PRIN - "GeA – Gendering Academia", which involves four Italian Universities and aims to explore gender inequalities in academic careers.

Drawing on research conducted with ten self-identifying critical pedagogues (SICPs) in English universities, this paper focuses on the role of self-reform and pedagogical reflection within the university. SICPs’ experiences of exclusion and typecasting will be contrasted with their desire to create spaces for colleagues to reflect on their practice and belong to a community of inquiry.

My doctoral research used observations and reflective dialogues (Clark, 2023) with SICPs to explore the disconnect between theory and practice. An interesting finding was the sense that participants often felt isolated by their pedagogical beliefs and practices. For example, one participant mentioned they felt lecturers using critical pedagogical or alternative approaches were labelled as ‘weird’. Despite being recognised by students for their teaching, participants were not asked by others what they were doing to receive these accolades, making them feel that the university and their colleagues didn’t care about their practice and only cared about student satisfaction. The implications of being made to feel ‘weird’ or ‘on the margins’ is that colleagues trying to implement a critical approach were made to feel isolated and like they were doing something subversive. This meant participants often felt they needed to hide their pedagogical beliefs from their colleagues or the university (Jeyaraj & Harland, 2016), instead relegating these practices to their classrooms as the only safe space they could create for critique and challenging the status quo.

Several participants also mentioned that they rarely have the space or time to reflect on their pedagogical beliefs or practices, potentially contributing to a mismatch between their pedagogical beliefs and practices, especially as they worked within an organisation and system that did not encourage their approach to teaching or challenging the status quo within the university. In these circumstances it is easy to see why they might feel there wasn’t space to reflect on their practice. However, feeling a sense of belonging to a community for critical educators might be transformative: Palmer (1992) found that a sense of community can be essential to sustaining individuals’ commitment to their own beliefs in his work on movements for change. Membership in such a group can help people feel less isolated when they realise that “even though they are out of step, they are not crazy” (ibid: 6).

Reflection on practice has long been praised within the teaching profession to provide space for self-reform and development of teaching practice (Schön, 1983; Argyris, 1976) or to engage in practitioner research to evaluate changes and interventions within the classroom. However, this space for reflection is often missing in the university. While there are often ‘built in’ reflection points for teaching staff at universities, these are often bureaucratic in nature and do not encourage true reflection or interrogation of one’s practice. Spaces, and perhaps multiple spaces, are needed for staff to engage in productive reflection on and discussion about their practice to “allow colleagues to find a space for critical reflection that is truly safe and productive for them” (Clark, 2023: 132).

The Teaching and Learning Centre (T&LC) is an institution established with the aim of promoting, recognising and enhancing the skills acquired by academic staff. The need to improve the quality of university teaching through the activation of qualified training paths and specific monitoring and evaluation strategies of faculty development actions, represent a priority for the Italian higher education system. The significant paradigm shift introduced by Faculty Development (Lotti & Lampugnani, 2020) concerns the shift from teacher-centred learning to student-centred learning (Sursock & Smidt, 2010; Warming & Frydensberg, 2017; Gover & Loukkola, 2018). Longitudinal studies on the pedagogical movement called Student Voice, investigated the importance of student involvement in improving the quality of teaching within universities, have proved "how student perspectives can support improved teaching/learning practices"(Rudduck & Flutter, 2004, p.132). Studies confirm that:"Giving young people more opportunities to express what they think about school and develop their sense of responsibility as members of a learning community means moving towards a different understanding of the role of students. Rather than being seen as dependent and incapable, they are to be seen as individuals with the right to be heard and respected, as well as the responsibility to act in ways that align with the best interests of their school community” (Rudduck & Flutter, 2004, p. 134). Hence, the need to develop and support teaching practices that support students in their education, and make them active and responsible members of the community in which they live.

This contribution presents two lines of research carried out by the T&LC of the University of Florence that intersect and complement each other. The first one concerns a survey aimed at investigating the opinion of academic staff (full professors, associate professors, researchers) with respect to the areas of improvement perceived by them and related to the design of teaching courses, teaching methodologies and the assessment of learning outcomes. Initial results show that teachers are especially interested in participating in: moments of interdisciplinary discussion on the use of effective teaching methods (61.4%); in-depth training seminars on issues related to teaching practice (50.5%). There were statistically significant differences (Chi-Square test) (p < .05) between the subgroups of survey participants and specifically with regard to the variable "disciplinary area". This data points to the need to construct targeted training actions with respect to the different profiles of the teaching staff. The second line of research is at a preliminary stage and aims to investigate the role of students as change agents, investing in their active, responsible and conscious participation in academic processes. Student representatives are directly involved in research in line with "undergraduate research approach" (Del Gobbo, Frison, 2022). Acting through teacher training on the areas investigated can have a bivalent impact on: quality within teaching and on student learning, as well as enhancing the activation of students as change agents. Students and teachers thus develop a sense of equal responsibility for the quality of teaching and learning in the wider university and training environment.