Lecturer / Assistant Professor
UCD School of Social Policy, Social Work and Social Justice
Sarah is a Lecturer and Assistant Professor at UCD School of Social Policy, Social Work and Social Justice. She is Vice Principal for Teaching and Learning for the College of Social Sciences and Law and Director of the Community Partnership Drugs Programme. Her research interests focus on gender and drug policy and intervention, as well as participative and action-focused research methodologies. She has extensive experience in policy, practice and outcome evaluation in relation to addressing complex issues including domestic and sexual violence and drug and alcohol use.
As Service Development Manager for Safe Ireland for ten years, she took a lead role in identifying and responding to critical issues affecting women and children's lives in regard to violence and abuse, including substance use. She is co-author of Implementing a Gender Approach in Drug Policies Prevention, Treatment and Criminal Justice, a handbook for practitioners and decision makers.
Over the previous ten years, she focussed on the interplay of domestic violence and substance use in families, developing national and regional response strategies for domestic violence services in Ireland, as well as leading organisation-based research and practice development in relation to drugs and alcohol.
In 2020 she was joint recipient of the of the European Award for Excellence in Teaching in the Social Sciences and Humanities. Dr Morton currently sits on the National Oversight Committee for the National Drug Strategy and her research interests include the intersection of substance use and violence, as well as creative and participative research methodologies.