Rate My Professor Aida Hurem

Dr. Aida Hurem serves as a Lecturer in Inclusive Education within the Faculty of Education at Southern Cross University. She is affiliated with the Sustainability, Environment and Arts in Education (SEAE) Research Centre and the TeachLab team. Her research specializations encompass inclusive education, neurodiversity, equity in education, wellbeing and belonging, particularly for international students and autistic individuals. Hurem advocates for Universal Design for Learning (UDL) to enhance accessibility and social justice in educational settings. Additional academic interests include AI applications in education, autistic students' experiences in mathematics, and the integration of international pre-service teachers in Australian early childhood education contexts. As an openly autistic academic and intersectional researcher drawing from psychology and education, she emphasizes lived experience, moving beyond tokenism, and creating environments where neurodiverse students can thrive without masking.

Hurem's career trajectory includes positions across multiple faculties at Griffith University, such as Health Executive, Psychology, Nursing, Education, and the Autism Centre of Excellence, where she contributed to the university-wide BOLD project on UDL. This initiative earned People's Choice recognition and Vice-Chancellor's commendation, resulting in key resources like Understanding UDL Principles and Designing Units with UDL. She holds a Master of Education and Professional Studies from Griffith University and completed her PhD there. Notable publications include 'The Link between Social Wellbeing, Belonging, and Connectedness of International Students in Australian High Schools' (Frontiers in Education, 2021), 'International Students in the First Years of Senior Secondary Schooling in Australia: Longing for Belonging' (International Journal of Educational Development, 2021), 'Affinity Spaces and the Situatedness of Intercultural Relations between International and Domestic Students in Two Australian Schools' (Educational Review, 2024), and 'Harmonizing Identities: A Scoping Review on Voice and Communication Supports for Autistic Children' (2025). Hurem serves on the advisory board of the World Disability Advocacy Rotary Club, develops mentoring programs for neurodiverse students, and contributes to public discourse through The Conversation articles on social media literacy.