This is a free event open to staff and students affiliated with the University of Melbourne. Please use your University email address to register.

The Community-Engaged Research Community of Practice (CER-CoP) is a new student and early career researcher-led group auspiced by the Melbourne Social Equity Institute. Our aim is to help champion community-engaged research across the university, and provide opportunities for both established and emerging researchers to reflect on their practices and improve their engagement with communities throughout the research process.

Community-engaged research (CER) involves a high level of community decision-making and partner involvement in the purpose, design, conduct and use of research. Community-engaged and co-productive methodologies require equitable relationships between those in the academy and those working within the community. Like all research, there are challenges and questions that arise when conducting CER.

This seminar, run by the Community-Engaged Research Community of Practice (CER-CoP), endeavors to explore these challenges and questions in search of working towards better practice. An informal panel of three experts in community-engaged and consumer-led research and practice will reflect on their experiences and guide the discussion.

More broadly, the seminar aims to start a conversation around what a Community-Engaged Research Community of Practice (CER-CoP) might do at the University of Melbourne, and hear from participants about issues, challenges or topics related to community-engaged research that might inform future CoP sessions in 2024.

Light refreshments will be provided and there will be an opportunity to network with fellow attendees.

Speakers

Dr Nicholas Hill, The University of Melbourne

Dr Nicholas Hill is a sociologist in the School of Social and Political Sciences. His research focuses on LGBTIQA+ experiences of mental health and suicidality, and lived experience of psychiatric diagnoses and related care, including compulsory treatment orders. Nicholas specialises in community engaged research, undertaking innovative participatory projects exploring sensitive topics, and producing practical resources for service users, community organisations and government.

Associate Professor Karen Block, The University of Melbourne

Associate Professor Karen Block is Associate Director of the Child and Community Wellbeing Program, Centre for Health Equity, in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health and the Academic Convenor of the Anti-racism Hallmark Research Initiative. She is also the Academic Lead of the Melbourne Social Equity Institute’s research program, Migration and Mobility and Academic Convenor of the associated Interdisciplinary PhD program in Migration, Statelessness and Refugee Studies. A/Prof Block has a strong national and international profile in the area of migration studies, exploring the interplay between host communities and migrants and the complex ways in which this interaction affects health inequalities, integration, inclusion and social cohesion.

Leslie Arnott, Lamaze Co-founder

For over 20 years, Leslie has been a Consumer Advisor/Advocate in the maternity care sector and now more broadly across health research. Having held lead roles in Consumer & Community Involvement (CCI) at the Monash Centre for Health Research Implementation (MCHRI), the Women's Health Research Translation & Impact Network (WHRTN), and as a co-founder of a not-for-profit charity, Lamaze Australia, she is now the Consumer Engagement Manager at Melbourne University's Centre for Digital Transformation of Health (CDTH). Her work is about connecting with communities and leveraging consumer voices, supporting clinicians and researchers to partner with consumer groups to provide research that is community-relevant, and through an equity lens, influences changes in policy, research and service delivery, that ultimately lead to improved health outcomes for all Australians.