My research interests include refugee education, forced migration, disability studies, and inclusive education, with a particular focus on the philosophical and ethical foundations of belonging, justice, and sanctuary in educational settings.

I am Professor of Education and Pathway Leader, BA (Hons) Education Studies and Special Educational Needs, and Visiting Professor at the University of Nottingham. I hold a British Academy/Leverhulme Senior Research Fellowship (2025–26), awarded in a national competition with a 7% success rate for a project judged to be "of outstanding quality and originality." From 2015 to 2018 I served as Faculty Head of Research and Knowledge Exchange, and I co-led Unit of Assessment 23 (Education) in preparation for REF submission.

My work has appeared in leading education journals, including the Oxford Review of Education, British Journal of Sociology of Education, Cambridge Journal of Education, and the International Journal of Inclusive Education, for which I sit on the editorial advisory board. I am also an Associate Editor of Frontiers in Education (Special Educational Needs) and an External Examiner for the University of Birmingham's PGCE International Education and MA Education (Inclusion, Equity and Transformation) programmes in Malaysia.

Several special issues of the International Journal of Inclusive Education bear my editorship, most recently Disputing Deindividualisation: Learning with and from refugees and migrants to make education more inclusive (2026), alongside earlier issues on refugees and inclusive education (2021) and on Hannah Arendt and educational administration. With colleagues from the Universities of Vienna and Aarhus, I co-edited a special issue of Frontiers in Education on forced migration, education, and disability (2023).

My recent books include Forced Migration, Disability and Education: Inclusion and exclusion at the intersection of displacement and disablement (Routledge, 2026, co-edited with Milada Bacakova and Julie Wharton), Education in an Altered World: Pandemic, Crises and Young People Vulnerable to Educational Exclusion (Bloomsbury, 2023, with Michelle Proyer, Fabio Dovigo, and Elisabeth Seitinger), and Education for a World in Crisis: Hannah Arendt on Educational Thinking and Practice in Dark Times (Bloomsbury, 2020, co-edited with Helen Gunter). A further monograph, Education as Sanctuary: Belonging, Beloved Time, and the Promise of the Newcomer (with Joanna McIntyre and Julie Wharton), is nearing completion, drawing on testimony from displaced learners across primary schools, Further Education colleges, and universities.

Recent keynote addresses include the EU Policy Dialogue on Transforming Refugee Inclusion in Education in Brussels (2025), and earlier addresses in Chile, Vienna, Norway, and Poland, on themes including inclusive refugee education, otherisation and assimilation, and the implementation of Article 24 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. In 2023 I was invited as an expert to the World Refugee Day Roundtable at Portcullis House, Westminster.

Winchester's role in the five-country Erasmus+-funded consortium Improving Teaching to Improve Refugee Education (ITIRE) was led by me, producing a Self-Assessment Tool now used by schools across Europe to guide reflection on the inclusion of refugee students. As co-investigator on the Rwanda Diaspora Youth Partnership Programme, led by Dr Jen Dickinson and funded by the Global Challenges Research Fund, I examined how second-generation Rwandans in the UK might support social enterprise in Rwanda; this work led to a co-authored article in Political Geography (2023).

Ten doctoral students have completed under my supervision as Director of Studies, and a further three as second supervisor, across topics including refugee education, disability, autism, and inclusive pedagogy; I currently supervise doctoral research on inclusive higher education and autism. I lead CREATE, the Centre for Research for Educational Action and Theory Exchange.

A 2020 webinar I organised on children vulnerable to exclusion during the pandemic led to an edited collection, published by Bloomsbury Academic. I convened the inaugural conference of the University of Winchester's Sanctuary Network in 2023, and I currently chair the Hampshire Hub for Sanctuary Teachers and serve on the Steering Committee of the Hub for European Refugee Education.

·       Refugee education

·       Inclusive education

·       Disability studies

Research publications 

Edited books

Bacakova, M., Veck, W. and Wharton, J. 2026. eds. Forced Migration, Disability and Education: Inclusion and exclusion at the intersection of displacement and disablement. London: Routledge.

Proyer, M., Veck, W., Dovigo, F., and Seitinger, E. 2023. Education in an Altered World: Pandemic, Crises and Young People Vulnerable to Educational Exclusion. London: Bloomsbury.

Veck, W. and Gunter, H. M 2020. eds. Education for a world in crisis: Hannah Arendt on educational thinking and practice in dark times. London: Bloomsbury.

Book chapters

Veck, W., 2026. Attentive intersectionality and the inclusion of disabled refugees in education. In: M. Bacakova, W. Veck and J. Wharton, eds. Forced Migration, Disability and Education: Inclusion and exclusion at the intersection of displacement and disablement. London: Routledge.

Dovigo, F., Proyer, M., and Veck, W., 2025. Belonging and Inclusive Refugee Education. In: Theorising exclusionary pressures in education: Why inclusion becomes exclusion, Elizabeth Done ed. London: Palgrave-Springer.

Veck, W. 2022. Refugee student identities and educational exclusion, In: International Encyclopedia of Education, 4th Edition, R. Tierney, F. Rizvi, and K. Ercikan eds. Elsevier Science.

Veck, W. 2020. Hannah Arendt, education and the refugee crisis: natality, compensatory education and assimilation. In: Education for a world in crisis: Hannah Arendt on educational thinking and practice in dark times, Veck, Wayne and Gunter, Helen M. eds. London: Bloomsbury, pp. 93-106.

Veck, W., Pagden, L. & Wharton, J. 2018. Children Seeking Refuge, Assimilation and Inclusion: Insights from the United Kingdom. In: Challenges and Opportunities in Education for Refugees in Europe: From Research to good Practices, Dovigo, Fabio ed.  Rotterdam: Sense, pp. 161-176.

Veck, W. 2016. Disability and inclusive education in times of austerity. In: Bhopal, Kalwant and Shain, Farzana ed. Neoliberalism and education: rearticulating social justice and inclusion. London: Routledge.

Veck, W. 2015. Hannah Arendt, education and power. In: Kupfer, Antonia ed. Education and power: Contexts of oppression and opportunity. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 13-25.

Veck, W. 2015. Participation in Education as an Invitation to Become Towards the World: Hannah Arendt on the authority, thoughtfulness and imagination of the educator. In: Smith, Richard ed. Philosophy of Education II: Major Themes in Education.

Special issues

2026, Lead editor of a special issue of International Journal of Inclusive Education on Disputing Deindividualisation: Learning with and from refugees and migrants to make education more inclusive.

2023, Co-editor of a special issue of Frontiers in Education on Forced migration, education, and disability.

2021, Lead editor of a special issue of International Journal of Inclusive Education on refugees and inclusive education.

2016, Lead-editor of a special issue of Journal of Educational Administration and History on Hannah Arendt and thinking about educational administration. 

Peer-reviewed articles in academic journals

Biewer, G., Dovigo, F., Proyer, M., and Veck. W. 2023. Editorial: Education, Forced Migration, and Disability. Frontiers in Education, 8.

Dickinson, J. and Veck, W. 2023. Being-in-family and being-in-community: Ontological (in)securities, diaspora youth agencies, and the Rwandan emigration state. Political Geography.

Veck, W., Dovigo, F. & Proyer, M. 2021. Editorial: Refugees and Inclusive Education. International Journal of Inclusive education, 25 (2). 109-115. eck, W and Wharton, J. 2019. Refugee children, trust and inclusive school cultures. International Journal of Inclusive education, 25 (2). 210-223. eck, W. & Hall, M. 2018. Inclusive research in education: dialogue, relations and methods, International Journal of Inclusive Education, 24 (10). 1081-1096.

Veck, W. & Jessop, S. 2016. Hannah Arendt 40 years on: Thinking about educational administration. Journal of Educational Administration and History, 48. (2). 129-135. 

Veck, W. 2014. Inclusive pedagogy: Ideas from the ethical philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. Cambridge Journal of Education, 44. (4). 451-464. 

Veck, W. 2014. Disability and inclusive education in times of austerity. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 35. (5). 777-799. 

Veck, W. 2014. Hope, disability and inclusive participation in education. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 18. (2). 177-195. 

Veck, W. 2013. Martin Buber's concept of inclusion as a critique of special education. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 17. (6). 614-628. 

Veck, W. 2013. Participation in Education as an Invitation to Become Towards the World: Hannah Arendt on the authority, thoughtfulness and imagination of the educator. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 45. (1). 36-48. 

Veck. W. 2012. Reflecting on ADHD and disaffection in education with Erich Fromm. Disability and Society, 27. (2). 263-275. 

Veck, W. 2009. Listening to include. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 13. (2). 141-155. 

Veck, W. 2009. From an exclusionary to an inclusive understanding of educational difficulties and educational space: Implications for the Learning Support Assistant’. Oxford Review of Education, 35. (1). 41-56. 

Reports

Veck, W, Wharton, J. and Pagden, L. 2020. Refugee Education approaches and strategies in western Europe. In An Overview of Refugee Education in Europe, edited by F. Dovigo. 

I contributed to the report: The Health and Wellbeing of Children in the Early Years.  Chapter 6, Access to support for children from migrant, refugee, culturally and ethnically diverse and socioeconomically deprived communities. The Children’s Alliance