GC Europe Staff

Our team is led by the master’s program director and is comprised of academic and administrative staff members. They ensure smooth implementation of the programme including coordination of teaching faculty, student support during the Venice-based semester and the mobility semester, and compliance with policies and regulations.

Dr. Orla Ní Cheallacháin - Global Campus

EMA Programme Director

Dr. Orla Ní Cheallacháin

Dr Orla Ní Cheallacháin joined the Global Campus as EMA Programme Director in 2021. She is responsible for the operational and academic management of the programme, student support, and liaison with the network of EMA professors and other stakeholders.

She is also responsible for teaching the International Relations Rolling Seminar, academic skills, research methods and thesis proposal workshops in addition to other teaching contributions throughout the first semester.

Orla holds a PhD in Politics and International Relations from University College Dublin, an MSc (Econ) in Terrorism and International Relations from Aberystwyth University, and a Postgraduate Certificate in Social Research Skills with a specialism in researching violently divided societies from the University of Ulster. She holds a BA in History and Language and Cultural Studies (Italian) from University College Cork.

Orla’s doctoral research comprised a critical discourse analysis of emergency counterterrorism debates in the United Kingdom with a view to understanding the politics of crisis legislating over time and how human rights are protected during times of crisis. The project analysed how terrorism was conceptualised by the legislature when introducing, renewing or expanding counterterrorism law and examined the legislature’s role in the normalisation of emergency powers. The project compared conceptualisations of terrorism during the Northern Ireland conflict and the so-called ‘global war on terror’. She is currently working on several articles informed by her doctoral research.

Orla’s research interests include critical approaches to International Relations and security studies, including feminist approaches, the role of gender in peace and conflict, issues of global justice in relation to the climate and biodiversity crises, and how different ‘ways of knowing’, including the arts, inform knowledge production and expertise.

Before joining the Global Campus, Orla taught courses on International Relations, critical security studies, and gender, peace and conflict at University College Dublin and provided teaching assistance on a range of courses including political theory, comparative politics and research methods. In addition, she worked as a Writing Instructor at the UCD Writing Centre providing tuition on academic writing skills, critical thinking and postgraduate thesis support.

Email: orla.nicheallachain@gchumanrights.org

Tel: +39 041 2720920

 
 

Read More

Dr. Inge Zwart - Global Campus

Junior EMA Fellow

Dr. Inge Zwart

Dr. Inge Zwart assists in the everyday organisation of the EMA programme, provides student support, teaches academic and research skills and contributes to the rolling seminar on Philosophy of Human Rights.

Inge holds a PhD in Information Studies from Uppsala University, an MA in Public Humanities from Brown University and a BA in liberal arts – philosophy, history, and sociology, from University College Roosevelt (Utrecht University). Her doctoral research focused on participatory projects in museums, as part of a larger H2020 project on participatory memory practices for social inclusion. In particular, she conducted ethnographic fieldwork in museums in Sweden and Germany which had long standing experience in community engagement and participatory work with various local groups. Her study approached their work from an organisational point of view and looked at professional practices, discussing in which ways such project-based work is maintained and the emotional and affective practices practitioners engage in when working with marginalised communities.

At Uppsala University, she taught on Cultural Heritage and Digital Humanities, Decolonial and Gender Perspectives on Digital Libraries and Archives, and qualitative research methods. Her research interests lie at the intersection of public history, critical heritage studies and memory studies in relation to local social justice and human rights issues. She is interested in how memory institutions such as archives and museums engage with and are criticised for their imperial and colonial histories – embedded in their organisational structures as well as their collections – and how this affects their contemporary practices. Furthermore, she is interested in the place, politics and experiences of collective memory in societies, especially in relation to memory sites, monuments and art.

Previously, Inge worked for various educational and cultural non-profits as museum educator, programme assistant and in communications. As such, she also has an interest in questions of (professional) practice in the field of human rights organisations and non-profits, in relation to translating goals such as social inclusion into programmes, funding structures and everyday work practices. She builds on this practical experience as a scholar, with a strong interest in public scholarship. For example, she worked for public history projects such as Mapping Slavery and co-developed professional development tools and workshops for the cultural heritage sector in relation to evaluation methods and participatory projects. She has an ongoing project, co-developed with Anne Chahine as part of POEM 2020, the Digital Archive of Forgotten Memories, through which she has organised participatory interventions around questions of remembering and forgetting on individual and societal levels, educating publics about the role of archives and museums in society, and engaging people in critical discussions about these topics.

Email: inge.zwart@gchumanrights.org

Tel: +39 041 2720918

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/izwart/

 
 

Read More

Dr. Chiara Altafin - Global Campus

Research Manager

Dr. Chiara Altafin

Dr. Chiara Altafin leads various research-based activities and projects at the GC Headquarters, with a primary focus on strengthening research, education, training, network-building and advocacy for the rights of children. Since September 2015 she has also worked as EMA Fellow, and lectures on topics related to human rights, International and European law, coordinates and teaches in the Children’s Rights Cluster, and conducts academic skills, legal research methods and thesis proposal workshops.

Chiara holds a Ph.D in International Law from the European University Institute, an LL.M in Comparative, European and International Law from the EUI, a Master’s in Rule of Law, Democracy and Human Rights from LUISS University, and graduated cum laude at the Law Department of Roma Tre University. She was a visiting research scholar at the Center for International and Comparative Law of the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor. Her main research interests concern economic, social and cultural rights in times of crisis, including in contexts of armed conflict and occupation, children’s rights, business and human rights, social justice, environmental and climate justice, and governance.

Chiara leads the UN Global Study component of the ACRiSL project (2020-2023), focusing on children’s rights affected by migration-related detention. She has also led a project aimed at enacting the Global Study recommendations in the European Context, engaging with ENOC as well as national and regional ombudspersons in Italy. In 2018-2019 she was lead researcher on the situation of ‘children living in prisons with their primary caregivers’ for the UN Global Study on Children Deprived of Liberty, and the main author of the related chapter.

Chiara is one of the editors of GC Human Rights Preparedness. Previously she edited the GCHRJ’s first special focus on children’s rights. She coordinated the EMA research contributions to the Global Classroom 2021 and 2020. She contributed to the GC MOOCs on ‘Children Deprived of Liberty’ and ‘Child Participation and the Right to a Sustainable Environment’. In 2016-2017 she was senior researcher on the FP7 FRAME project.

Over the last thirteen years Chiara worked as lecturer and research and teaching assistant in International Law, International Organization and Human Rights, Human Rights and International Protection, International Protection of Cultural Heritage, and International Criminal Law at LUISS University, where she also was a member of the Research Team on the FP7 PRIV-WAR project. She conducted research and editorial activities for IAI (Istituto Affari Internazionali). She worked as a trainee lawyer at Avvocatura Generale dello Stato in Rome (2005-2007) and has been admitted to the Italian Bar.

Email: chiara.altafin@gchumanrights.org

Tel: +39 041 2720919

 
 

Read More

Martina Urbinati - Global Campus

EMA Executive Officer

Martina Urbinati

Martina started working for the Global Campus in 2022. She liaises with students for what concerns certificates, general enquiries about the EMA Programme’s structure and other administrative procedures. Additionally, she is responsible for the daily update of EMA’s platform on inter-departmental activities.

Martina holds a MA in Interdisciplinary Research and Studies on Eastern Europe at the University of Bologna. After defending her graduation thesis on the topic of identity and belonging of internally displaced persons in Ukraine, a shortened policy article of the same was published by the Temerty Contemporary Ukraine Program at the University of Harvard.

Before joining the GC, Martina was recruited as cultural mediator to teach Italian language to Ukrainian students. Previously, she worked at the Bologna Business School Foundation in the International Masters department. In her spare time, Martina volunteers for Erasmus+ mobility projects and writes for an online media outlet.

Email: ema.secretariat@gchumanrights.org and martina.urbinati@gchumanrights.org

Tel: +39 041 2720922

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martina-urbinati

 
 

Read More

Elisabetta Zennaro - Global Campus

EMA Executive Officer

Elisabetta Zennaro

Elisabetta Zennaro started working for the Global Campus in 2008. She dealt with all departments and assisted guests, students and staff members with all kinds of enquiries. She joined the EMA Team in June 2016. In her role as EMA Executive Officer she liaises with EMA professors and students for all that concerns meetings, certificates and academic records.

She also assists the EMA Programme Director and collaborates with the EMA staff on executive tasks. She deals with students’ records, careers, diplomas, and she is in charge of managing the EMA Internships and EIUC EU-UN Fellowship Programmes.

She previously spent two years in London, UK, working and studying English, photography and attended a Galileo Travel Consultant course; she also spent a year in Zaragoza, Spain, for a study project organized by Ca’ Foscari University of Venice.

Email: ema.secretariat@gchumanrights.org and elisabetta.zennaro@gchumanrights.org

Tel: +39 041 2720921

 
 

Read More