Meet Our Career Ambassadors

Justin is an urban anthropologist and youth studies academic. Justin has an extensive background in conducting research with marginalised populations and community service providers in the areas of youth work, domestic & family violence, youth & family homelessness, child protection, alcohol and other drugs and service use by vulnerable population groups.

Prior to his career as a researcher Justin was a youth worker in Adelaide and Canberra working with homeless young people. This experience led onto his PhD that examined the lives of homeless young people in Canberra. He has developed and implemented a range of qualitative research methodologies aimed at doing research with young people and vulnerable population groups. He has established professional networks with community service providers across Australia, providing service evaluation, training and policy advice. He has expert skills in research methods, desktop reviews, survey development, program evaluation and action research.

I’ll use the word innovative [for the community sector] because you have to be flexible … to get a better outcome for their clients that they’ll do what is necessary and piece together however they need to do it to get it done. They see value in people that other people don’t see value and opportunity and strength, I think, [the sector] is amazing.

Emma works at ACTCOSS as the Senior Sector Development Officer in the Sector Development team. Emma joined the community sector after a career change from being a horticulturist and went to university as a mature aged student.

Emma loves that the community sector has provided her with opportunities to work in a variety of sub sectors including community development, health promotion, volunteer management and the healthy cities movement. Emma has worked in community organisations as well as local and state government in the past but has returned to the community sector. She thinks the community sector gives her a close connection to her community, provides an opportunity to create social justice and generate change as well as allowing her to contribute to building a strong, fair and vibrant community in Canberra.

I really love that connection to community. I’ve worked in local and state government before and a little bit in Commonwealth, so just that real connection to community is what I really love. Making change that you can see that you probably wouldn’t be able to make if you worked in a government role often. Also, the variety. I’ve worked in lots of different organisations, your skills are quite transferable, and you get that variety.