AILA RESEARCH NETWORK FOR
CONTENT AND LANGUAGE INTEGRATED LEARNING
AILA Research
Network for CLIL
The CLIL ReN
Content and Language Integrated Learning has not only been a highly popular educational innovation in Europe and elsewhere, but it has also attracted a wide range of research interests and undertakings. The Research Network on Content and Language Integrated Learning and Immersion Classrooms (CLIL ReN) aims at joining expertise of CLIL researchers in language acquisition, language use, language pedagogy and subject pedagogy. This Research Network is supported by the International Association of Applied Linguistics (AILA) has been going strong since 2006. We hope that those of you engaged in research into CLIL will find issues of special interest to you and will also add your ideas and contributions, thus bringing the site to life.​
Our Scope
The CLIL ReN boasts a large and varied membership, including teachers and researchers with expertise in both linguistic and non-linguistic disciplines, such as language acquisition, language use, language pedagogy, subject pedagogy and other areas of educational sciences. In 2025-27, the CLIL ReN aims to build on this strength by focusing on the CLIL practice-research nexus, across educational levels and contexts. In addition to bringing together the expertise researchers from various CLIL-related fields, we will focus on what and how practioners and researchers can learn from and with each other. We will strive to provide platforms and opportunities to facilitate scientific networking and knowledge-sharing in ways that benefit researchers and are also relevant and accessible to practitioners. In this way, we hope to increase the practical value and relevance of CLIL research, while also furthering the international CLIL research agenda and stimulating collaboration and communication in the field.
Meet the Team
Darío Luis BANEGAS
Dario Luis Banegas is Senior Lecturer in Language Education at the University of Edinburgh where he leads a master's course on the language curriculum. He is also Director of Postgraduate Research at the School of Education and Sport. His main interests are: CLIL, action research, social justice language education, and language teacher education curriculum development.
Tessa MEARNS
Tessa Mearns is Assistant Professor and teacher educator in the World Teachers Programme at ICLON Graduate School of Teaching, Leiden University, the Netherlands. Her main research and teaching interests are: CLIL and disciplinary literacies; justice, equity, diversity and inclusion (JEDI); and global citizenship, in both teaching and teacher education. She is an active member of several local and international networks, including CLIL Connect, the audit committee for bilingual secondary schools in the Netherlands, COST CLILNetLE, and the steering group for the World CLIL conferences.
