Margaret Kelly retired from the Department of Education and Skills in 2012. Her work there included responsibility for policy, funding and monitoring of programmes aided under the European Social Fund, (1989 -1998), Further and Adult Education, (1998-2003) and more recently, curriculum policy and developments at first and second level education. During the 1990s and up to 2003 Margaret was the Principal Officer with responsibility for a major expansion of Further Education and Training – Vocational Training Opportunities Scheme (VTOS), Youthreach, Post Leaving Certificate (PLC) and adult literacy provision, and the introduction of the Back to Education Initiative, the Adult Educational Guidance Service and the appointment of Community Education Facilitators. She was the education representative on various inter-Departmental Committees on tacking poverty and unemployment, homelessness, childcare, and meeting skills needs.
Margaret has been serving as NALA’s Chairperson since October 2020. Margaret is also the Chairperson of our Literacy and Staff Policies, and Governance Subcommittee.

Aoife Foley is the National Financial Inclusion & Social Policy Worker with National Traveller Money Advice and Budgeting Service (NTMABS). Before joining NTMABS she worked in adult and community education and has a background in human rights law. Aoife has worked as a voluntary literacy tutor in Kerry and Dublin.
Aoife has served on NALA’s Board since April 2022 and is a member of our Audit, Risk and Finance Subcommittee.

Ciaran Casey is Chief Customer Officer and Commercial Director at Saol Assurance t/a AIB life. Prior to this he held a number of roles within AIB including Head of Digital Channels and Group Head of Deposit and Current Account Products. Ciaran is a Chartered Banker and Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA).
Ciaran has served on NALA’s Board since 2020 and is a member of our Audit, Risk and Finance Subcommittee.

Maria O’Gorman is from Listowel in County Kerry. For many years she worked as an accountant for a manufacturing company. She does a lot of work in the adult education sector and represents adult learners on a variety of committees and she is on the board of Kerry Education and Training Board (ETB). Maria is also on the board of Irish Rural Link, which is the national network representing rural communities. Maria has served on NALA’s Board since 2017

Catherine Devlin is an adult literacy student from Buncrana in County Donegal. She worked in a shirt factory from the age of 15 years having left school early after struggled daily at school. Catherine started back to education in 2013 on the ‘Learning for Living’ programme with Donegal Education and Training Board (ETB). She worked her way to doing the Junior Certificate through day, night and summer classes. She really enjoyed learning this second time around. She found that tutors had kindness, patience and an understanding of pupils who had struggled at school from an early age. This made going back to education a pure joy for her. In 2017, Catherine gave a talk at an ETB event in Letterkenny and then joined NALA’s Student Subcommittee. She is currently Chairperson of the Subcommittee.

Dr Eleanor Neff works in the Literacy Development Centre in South East Technical University. Eleanor has worked in adult education for 21 years with a focus on literacy work for the past 14 years. As a tutor with Kerry Education and Training Board, she delivered a wide range of literacy courses and worked on the Refugee Resettlement Programme. In 2020, she worked with NALA’s Distance Learning team and Marking Progress project.
Eleanor has served on NALA’s Board since April 2022 and is the Chairperson of our Education, Training and Assessment Subcommittee.

Elma Teahan is a director in the Financial Services Audit department in KPMG. A chartered accountant, Elma also holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from University College Cork (UCC).
She has 12 years’ experience providing audit, assurance, accountancy and advisory services to clients in insurance, investment management, banking and other sectors. Elma is an advocate of education and inclusion and diversity. She has served on NALA’s Board since December 2020 and is the Chairperson of our Audit, Risk and Finance Subcommittee

Margaret Hanrahan is an adult literacy student from County Tipperary. She learned to use the iPhone in her local centre in Cahir, with Tipperary ETB. She completed English and Communications courses at Levels 3 and 4 and has used the Learn with NALA website in the centre in Cahir. Having seen a notice on the website, she attended the 2022 NALA Student Day in Cork. Margaret won a case against the bank that was trying to take back her home. She is keen that people would not take out loans without reading and understanding everything they are signing. She is passionate about people, particularly women, being able to understand financial information. Margaret qualified as a legal assistant in early 2024, something she never thought she would be able to do.
Margaret was elected to NALA’s Board in 2024 and has been a member of NALA’s Student Subcommittee since 2022

Michelle is a Lecturer in the School of Pharmacy UCC, and a Senior Postdoctoral Researcher with the National Suicide Research Foundation. She has collaborated on the development of a UCC/NALA Digital Badge for Health Literacy for Health and Social Care Professionals and is a strong advocate for health literacy as an educator and in terms of lived experience research. She would be delighted to have the opportunity to engage further with NALA and contribute to the progression of health literacy education and policy at a national level. Michelle was elected to NALA’s Board in 2024

Patricia (Trish) Nolan has worked in the public library service for over thirty years and has also worked as a volunteer tutor. Currently she works as Executive Librarian with Carlow County Library Service and has an active interest in adult literacy. She is Right to Read Co-ordinator for Carlow County Council and has led many initiatives including the Carlow – A Literacy Friendly County research project.
Trish has served on NALA’s Board since April 2022 and is a member of our Literacy and Staff Policies, and Governance Subcommittee.

Paula Tiller is a Regional Literacy Coordinator for Kerry under the Adult Literacy for Life Strategy. Starting in 2001, as a volunteer literacy tutor, literacy teaching and advocacy has been a large part of her life since then. She has worked as a NALA distance learning tutor and has delivered workshops at NALA events. As well as her involvement in teaching, she has co-developed themed literacy programmes. She is an advocate for integrating literacy and Universal Design for Learning across the adult and further education sector.
Paula has served on NALA’s Board since May 2023 and is a member of our Education, Training and Assessment Subcommittee.

Tom O’Mara is Head of Digital Education in University College Cork. He manages the Centre for Digital Education, which provides support to staff around the best application of technology to learning.
An educator for over 27 years, Tom has worked as an English language teacher at third level in Ireland and abroad. He was also the Distance Education Coordinator with NALA for nine years. Tom led the design and development of www.writeon.ie and supported the development of the literacy TV series on RTÉ.
Tom has served on NALA’s Board since April 2022 and is a member of our Education, Training and Assessment Subcommittee.

Sarah was diagnosed with Dyslexia at 42. It was a huge burden lifted from her shoulders to finally understand the reason for her learning difficulties.

She had a gap in her knowledge of IT skills, and after being made redundant from her job, having worked for 26 years in retail she decided to up-skill. She knew in order to progress further and into higher education she needed to improve her IT skills in order to upload assignments and use technology such as Zoom, Outlook and Teams. This is where she was introduced to NALA.

Sarah has first-hand experience of the huge benefits that learning brings to peoples’ lives. People like her. She brings energy, enthusiasm and most importantly the voice of the adult learners to our Board. She wants to bring about a positive response for change for the betterment of every member going forward.

Sarah was elected to NALA’s Board in 2025 and has been a member of NALA’s Student Subcommittee since 2023.

Geraldine Mernagh has worked within the field of adult literacy in Ireland for forty years, starting as an adult literacy tutor in adult education centres, youth and community programmes and the prison service with the former City and County Dublin VEC. As the former Director of the National Adult Literacy Agency (NALA), (1989-1997), she worked closely with national and international practitioners, students and stakeholders, to inform the agency’s work of raising public awareness, policy development, advocacy and advisory work with government departments, tutor and student accreditation and development programmes, research, working parties and publications for adult literacy.

With NALA, she co-founded the Literacy Development Centre (LDC) in the South East Technological University (SETU) in 1997, where she has taught, worked with, and learned from tutors from all around Ireland, until her recent retirement. Geraldine’s work in the LDC included developing the BA (Hons) in Teaching in Adult and Further Education, particularly the observation and accreditation of tutors in their classrooms to build the relationship between relevant theory and good adult literacy practice on the ground.

Geraldine was appointed to the Board in 2025.