TU Dublin Research and Innovation Celebrates International Women Day 2025
TU Dublin Research and Innovation proudly joins the global community in celebrating International Women’s Day (IWD) 2025 under the theme 'Accelerate Action'. This year’s campaign underscores the urgency of taking swift and decisive steps toward achieving gender equality and dismantling systemic barriers that hinder women’s progress across all sectors. In recognition of IWD 2025, we celebrate the invaluable contributions of our Research and Innovation Support Staff, whose dedication fuels grant and funding development, impactful initiatives, research and innovation impact, community engagement, mentorship programs, and policy advocacy.
Spotlight on TU Dublin Research and Innovation Support Staff
Aideen O'Byrne - Post Award Lead, Research Support Services
Aideen exemplifies research support excellence by developing streamlined, compliant, and impactful research management services. Her innovative approach to coordinating key stakeholders—across HR, Research Finance, Knowledge Transfer, Impact, and Open Research—enables Principal Investigators (PIs) to focus on what matters most: their research. As one of the founding members of the steering committee for the new Irish Research Managers and Professionals Association (IRMPA), Aideen is deeply committed to advancing research management in Ireland. She also served as Co-Chair of the Irish Universities Association Research Officers Group in 2024, contributing to national research support strategies.
Through her leadership of the post award team at TU Dublin’s Research Support Services, Aideen has developed a service that ensures PIs experience a seamless project start and an implementation process that is robust, compliant, and efficient. By fostering cross-functional collaboration and proactively managing risks, her team supports researchers in achieving their objectives with clarity and confidence. Her dedication to strengthening Ireland’s research landscape is a testament to the power of innovation, collaboration, and action—values that perfectly align with this year’s International Women’s Day theme, 'Accelerate Action.'
Fiona Prendergast – Engagement and Impact Office Administrator
Fiona plays a crucial role in supporting research and innovation by ensuring smooth operations and effective project management. As part of the Engagement and Impact Team, she strengthens relationships with partners, communities, and stakeholders. By streamlining workflows and maintaining compliance, Fiona fosters a productive research environment that allows teams to focus on their impactful work.
Dr Giovanna Rampazzo - Research PhD Programme Coordinator
Giovanna supports graduate research students and their supervisors during years 3-4 of the programme. This includes the quality assurance processes for examination, thesis submissions and examiner nominations, transfers and confirmations. Giovanna organises viva voce examinations and helps with the arrangements for graduations. She works closely with colleagues and Student Services to ensure smooth integrated processes in relation to all above tasks. Passionate about research recruitment, Giovanna represents TU Dublin at career fairs such as Gradireland and FindAPhD, helping to attract future PhD students. She also coordinates professional development training and organises workshops to support students' academic journeys.
Güldan Kalem - Strategic Research Proposal Coordinator
Güldan supports the development of high-impact funding proposals for national and international funders, with a focus on EU programs. Holding a Master’s Degree in Educational Management, she is currently pursuing a PhD in European Studies, with a specialization in the EU's gender equality policies. As a strong advocate for gender-sensitive research, Güldan integrates gender and intersectionality perspectives into proposals. She previously contributed to the CALIPER-Linking Research and Innovation for Gender Equality project and played a key role in developing a Gender Equality Plan at her former university.
Nwabuogo Enwerem – Research Management Support Officer
With a background in law, human resources, public relations, and communications, Nwabuogo is a dedicated Research Management Support Officer at TU Dublin who specialises in providing administrative and financial support for funded research projects. Most of the projects she supports are European funded, as well as Enterprise Ireland (EI) and Research Ireland initiatives, and ensures smooth project execution from post-award to completion. Her role involves coordinating consortium meetings, organising project reviews, and the facilitation of financial and administrative processes, including researcher recruitment, procurement, and project supplier finance setup, while ensuring compliance with national and European regulations. Additionally, she provides project managers with essential support in document editing, activity planning, event and conference management. In the last two years, she has contributed to key projects such as Build Digital Mandate Conference, SELLSTEM (H2020 MSCA ITN), PANTOUR (EU Erasmus), and NEXUS (EU Horizon).
Nwabuogo takes pride in making research administration as seamless as possible so that researchers can focus on what truly matters innovation, discovery, and impact. Her leadership in equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) is evident in her numerous voluntary roles, including:
- Member TU Dublin EDI Council
- Chair, Race equity Working Group, TU Dublin EDI Council
- Steering Group Member of the Irish Research Professionals Management Association (current)
- Member and Co-Facilitator of the Race Equity Community of Practice (current)
- Member of the Athena SWAN Organisational Culture Subgroup (2020-2022)
- Member of the Strategic Plan Action Team (2020-2021)
- Member of the Student Services & Wellbeing OD Subgroup (2020)
Nwabuogo’s commitment to fostering an inclusive and supportive research environment aligns perfectly with 'Accelerate Action'.
Stacey Dempsey - Graduate Research School Coordinator
Stacey manages the Graduate Research School (GRS), overseeing all operations from student recruitment to final examinations. She ensures quality assurance in research programs and provides essential support to both students and faculty members. Stacey plays a pivotal role in organizing GRS events, including research symposia, structured training programs, and student induction sessions. She also leads promotional activities, helping to raise awareness of research opportunities at TU Dublin. Additionally, Stacey coordinates research student scholarship programs and provides essential support to students throughout their academic journey.
Through the expertise and commitment of our Research and Innovation Support Staff, we continue to champion 'Accelerate Action', ensuring that women in research, academia, and industry have the support and opportunities needed to thrive. Join us as we celebrate the some of the remarkable women driving change and shaping the future of research and innovation at TU Dublin.