Committee members
The WWBA is led by a steering committee comprising representatives from multiple faculties across the university, collaborators and a student representative.
Associate Professor Mehera San Roque (Co-Chair)
Associate Professor
UNSW Faculty of Law
Associate Professor Amanda Henry (Co-Chair)
Associate Professor in Obstetrics & GynaecologyÌý
School of Women's & Children's Health
Vinita Chanan
Director
UNSW Alliances & UNSW Co-Gender Champion
Associate Professor David Carter
Scientia Associate Professor in Law, Society and Criminology
UNSWÌýFaculty of Law & Justice
Rebecca Moran
Research Fellow
UNSW Big Anxiety Research Centre (BARC)
Rebecca Moran is an ALIVE National Centre Research Fellow at the Big Anxiety Research Centre (BARC) and Felt Experience and Empathy Lab (fEEL). Bec's work includes a focus on complex trauma, eating disorders, and how art, design, and technology innovations might be used in mental health in the community. Bec brings lived experience as well as practice and academic experience to her role and is passionate about lived experience engagement and dignity in all practices.
Bec's interest in joining the WWBA comes from this passion for social justice in representation, and from her lived experience as a woman with disabilities and carer responsibilities working in the challenging arena of academia.
Molly Saunders
PhD Candidate
UNSW Social Policy Research Centre
As a PhD Candidate at UNSW, Molly is examining gender inequity within marketised systems of disability support, using a case study analysis of women with disability's human rights within the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Molly also works as a Research Associate at the Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University, where she is supporting the delivery of a co-designed research project that aims to explore the experiences of young people with disability and young carers in relation to institutional listening. Broadly, Molly's research interests include critical feminist and disability theory, human rights, inclusive research methodologies, and minority group experiences of social policy.Ìý
Associate Professor Cheryl Carcel
Head of the Brain Health Program
The George Institute for Global Health
Associate Professor Cheryl Carcel is the Head of the Brain Health Program at The George Institute for Global Health and works part-time as a clinical neurologist. Cheryl is an NHMRC Emerging Leader Fellow, an Australian and New Zealand Stroke Organisation Emerging Stroke Clinician and Scientist, and a World Heart Federation Emerging Leader in Stroke.Ìý
Carcel’s research focuses on health equity, in particular working on sex and gender differences, women’s brain health, and policies encouraging disaggregation of data by sex and gender.Ìý
Joining the Women’s Wellbeing Academy offered a unique opportunity to engage in impact-driven research and practice by addressing tangible issues in women's health.
Aba Afful
PhD Candidate in the School of Built Environment
UNSW Faculty ofÌýArts, Design & Architecture
Aba Afful is a PhD candidate from Ghana in the UNSW School of Built Environment. She has an MPhil in Construction Management and a BSc in Quantity Surveying and Construction Economics from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). She has three years' experience in teaching and research at KNUST where she served as a Graduate Research and Teaching Assistant. Her research focuses on empowering women in the construction industry and is funded by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet’s Office for Women, as part of the Australian Government’s Women’s Leadership and Development Program and UNSW.Ìý
Her interest in joining the WWBA Steering Committee stems from her aspiration to actively engage in policy development, analysis, and implementation aimed at empowering women in the construction industry. Her research has instilled in her a strong commitment to effecting tangible change.Ìý
Sophie Burrage
Project Manager in the School of Photovoltaic and Renewable Energy Engineering (SPREE)
UNSW Faculty of Engineering
Sophie Burrage isÌýa Project Manager for the Sustainability Group in the School of Photovoltaic and Renewable Energy Engineering (SPREE).Ìý
Sophie helps project manage externally funded research projects within the Sustainability Group. She has always been interested in doing more to achieve equality and justice for women’s rights and since having a daughter this has only grown. She hopes that her skillset can help the WWBA in any way that she can!
Elena Cama
Research Fellow
UNSW Centre for Social Research in Health
Elena Cama is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Social Research in Health at UNSW.Ìý
Her PhD thesis examined sexual violence facilitated through dating and hookup platforms, for which she was awarded a Dean's Award for Outstanding PhD Theses in 2022.Ìý
She is currently working on a national study, which aims to develop and trial a new and novel stigma reduction intervention among health workers to reduce stigma and discrimination targeted at people affected by blood-borne viruses and sexually transmissible infections.Ìý
Rimi Nandy
PhD Candidate
UNSW Laureate Centre for History & Population
Rimi Nandy is a PhD candidate in the Laureate Centre for History & Population. Her doctoral work examines the social production of early-age hysterectomies in India.
Rimi began her career as a public health researcher, working with marginalised and under-served communities. For the last decade she was the manager in charge of community health education and product roll-out at a health technology lab focused on low-cost solutions for last mile areas.
In addition to her work in public health, Rimi is also an award-winning literary translator, with published and forthcoming titles from Penguin Random House and HarperCollins India.
Lucia Romani
NHMRC Senior Research Fellow and Group Leader of the Global Health Trial Group
UNSW Kirby Institute
Lucia Romani is an NHMRC Senior Research Fellow and Group Leader of the Global Health Trial Group at the Kirby Institute, and a Senior Research Fellow at the Murdoch Children's Research Institute. Lucia has over 15 years of experience leading and collaborating on implementation research focused on infectious diseases in low and middle-income countries. Lucia has extensive epidemiologic research experience in a diverse range of areas, including large-scale clinical trials and observational studies, mass drug administration for neglected tropical diseases, and sexually transmitted infections in resource-poor settings.
Catherine Rowe
Faculties & Divisions Engagement Lead - Program Phoenix
UNSW Founders
Catherine Rowe has over 20 years of management experience and has worked at UNSW since 2011. She brings a wealth of operations management experience from her previous career in retail management and through her roles at UNSW. She is currently Faculties & Divisions Engagement Lead for Program Phoenix and most recently the Deputy Faculty Executive Director. At UNSW she has been responsible for delivering strategic and operational services within the Faculty while developing and implementing Faculty-wide shared services.
Catherine’s experience has seen her work in school, faculty and divisional roles. She has supported faculties and now the University through significant changes including the workplace change with OPEX in 2017 and the COVID-related impacts leading to the creation of ADA in 2020.Ìý
Become a member
The WWBA is a space that enables those who work in the broad area of women’s wellbeing to connect and collaborate.ÌýWe have various types of membership to allow for UNSW staff and students as well as collaborators to join the WWBA.