Open lecture: Feminist Pedagogy and Critical Pedagogy Fostering Social Justice, Human Rights and Democracy
This lecture explores the role of Feminist Pedagogy and Critical Pedagogy as transformative educational approaches that foster social justice, human rights, and democratic engagement. Situated within the broader context of contemporary global challenges—such as inequality, gender-based violence, discrimination, and environmental crises—the lecture highlights the limitations of purely technological or economic solutions and emphasizes the central role of education in addressing these issues.
Drawing on the framework of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, particularly SDG 4: Quality Education, the lecture examines how education can function as a vehicle for social transformation and democratic participation. The participants of this lecture engage with the principles of Feminist and Critical Pedagogy, focusing on the analysis and deconstruction of systems of oppression across gender, class, race, and other intersecting identities.
The lecture also bridges theory and practice by emphasizing the development of critical, social, and pedagogical competencies necessary for educators, including self-reflection, cultural awareness, and the ability to design inclusive and socially responsive learning environments beginning from Early Childhood Education.
About associate Professor Vasiliki Pliogkou
Lecture is presented by Associate Professor Vasiliki Pliogkou from University of Western Macedonia
Vassiliki received her BA in Pedagogy at the University of Patras. She completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Ghent in Belgium. She has two MA, the first one on the subject of "Comparative Education and Human Rights" from the University of Athens and the Institute of Education of the University of London and the second in "Bilingual Special Education" from the University of Western Macedonia.
She received her PhD in Science Education from the Department of Primary Education in Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. She had been for many years (1997 to present) academic staff and a member on research programs at the Democritus University of Thrace, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, the University of Ioannina, while she has a continuous cooperation with the Hellenic Open University, the University of Athens, the School of Pedagogical and Technological Education in Thessaloniki and the Frederick University of Cyprus. During the spring semester of 2025, she was a visiting professor at the Department of Early Childhood Education and Care, Faculty of Teacher Education and International Studies, Oslo Metropolitan University in Norway, through the ERASMUS+ Faculty Mobility Program.
She is a reviewer in over 25 Greek and International Journals. She has more than 180 presentations in Greek and International conferences and relative publications in collective volumes, Greek and International Journals and proceedings, which focus on human rights education, childhood and children’s rights, citizenship, family-school connection, gender and educational implementations using different pedagogical tools in various formal and non-formal educational environments.
From 1998 till now, she has organised or co-organised events, such as conferences, seminars, educational activities which have been mainly addressed to students at the Department of Early Childhood and Primary Education, educators, preschool and primary school children and their families. Since 2011, she is the president of OMEP (World Organization for Early Childhood Education) in Central Macedonia. She has been awarded the first prize of the International Committee of OMEP for 2016 in Education for Sustainable Development under the UNESCO Global Action Programme, at the University of Ewha Womans in Seoul (S. Korea)
