Simon Copland – Page 42

Students step into science shoes

Originally published in ANU, On Campus, April 18 2012

A group of Indigenous school students from around Australia experienced life as science students at ANU last week.

The students – from as far afield as Darwin – came to ANU as part of the Indigenous Youth Science Camp run by the Joint Colleges of Science.

During the two-day camp, the students made ice-cream using liquid nitrogen, discovered why waves on the beach are foamy and why sand sometimes squeaks when walked on, and explored the Universe from the ANU Mount Stromlo Observatory.

The camp provided the students with the opportunity to meet current ANU Indigenous students and hear about their university experiences.

The participants also met ANU Vice-Chancellor Ian Young and the first Indigenous member of the ACT Parliament, Minister for Education Chris Bourke, during an official dinner at Mount Stromlo.

Camp organiser Mr Jonathan Dampney said the camp was a great success.

“This camp has provided an opportunity for these students to get a taste of university life. We look forward to seeing these students come back to ANU in future years,” Mr Dampney said.

All hail Malcolm Turnbull

Originally published in New Matilda on 4 April 2012. (http://newmatilda.com/2012/04/04/all-hail-malcolm-turnbull)

Progressive people in Australia are facing a significant dilemma: as Prime Minister, Julia Gillard is disappointing many and Tony Abbott is not an acceptable alternative. If elected, he would be the most conservative prime minister in decades.

This dilemma is leading to some strange conclusions. Too many progressives are now looking back at the period of Malcolm Turnbull’s leadership with such rose-coloured glasses that they see him as the solution to all our ills. With his martyrdom over the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) and his support for same-sex marriage, Turnbull is now seen as having the passion and drive that is lacking in Gillard. He seems to have adopted enough progressive positions to forgive the fact that he is in the Liberal Party. He is apparently the perfect alternative.

Such an analysis however lacks a true understanding of what a Turnbull government would mean. Even in the unlikely event that Turnbull was returned to Coalition leadership sometime soon, promoting this Turnbull-as-saviour analyis is also to promote a politician who would take progressive ideals and policies backward.

If there is anything that has won progressive activists over to Team Turnbull it has been his stance on climate change. After his support for the CPRS brought down his leadership he became a hero to many in the climate movement.

What is forgotten is that in the negotiations around the CPRS, Turnbull significantly watered the legislation down from its already pretty rotten core. His amendments included, among others, significant increases in compensation to polluting industries and the permanent exclusion of agriculture from the scheme. It was enough for the Australian Conservation Foundation to remove its support for the scheme. Based on this history, it is very possible that watering down the current carbon package could definitely be on the agenda of a Turnbull Government. It is hard to see any scenario where Turnbull would strengthen climate laws as prime minister.

In other areas as well, Turnbull has taken very conservative positions.

For example, Turnbull recently stated that he thought that the Fair Work Bill has gone “too far”. As leader of the Coalition he argued for the reintroduction of temporary protection visas and for offshore processing for all asylum seekers. He also continues to actively oppose the means testing of the private health care rebate, the Minerals Resource and Rent Tax and the National Broadband Network. It’s nice to think many of these positions would change if he was leader but the evidence of his time at the helm doesn’t suggest that will be the case.

Yet, what is worse about a potential Turnbull government is the ministers who would come with him. Based on his shadow cabinet from when he was leader, a Turnbull prime ministership would result in a cabinet including Eric Abetz, Christopher Pyne, Peter Dutton, George Brandis, Warren Truss and (if he wasn’t required to stand down) Tony Abbott. Given the changes that have taken place within the Coalition since he was leader, it is almost certain that we would see people such as Sophie Mirabella, Cory Bernardi and Michaelia Cash in some position of power too.

It’s nice to think that Turnbull could keep these ministers in line but we all know that a prime minister cannot control every element of their government. The decisions of ministers may not be as big as those of a prime minister but what we have seen with the election of Liberal governments in Victoria (with decisions around issues such as wind farm regulation, negotiations with nurses, and swearing in public), and in New South Wales (with its introduction of a “surrogate form of WorkChoices”), is that decisions that don’t make headlines in a campaign can have a huge effect.

There are genuine reasons to be disappointed with the Gillard Government. But to think that we can deal with this disappointment by making Malcolm Turnbull our Prime Minister is dangerous at best. A Liberal Government is a Liberal Government — no matter who is leading it.

If we want a progressive Parliament then we need to vote and campaign for a real progressive alternative. Gillard and Abbott may not be the people progressives want in the top job — but Malcolm Turnbull is certainly not the alternative we need.

Discovery shakes belief of Earth to the core

For a century, scientists have assumed that the Earth has the same chemical makeup as the sun. But this belief has been challenged by Professor Ian Campbell and Professor Hugh O’Neill from the Research School of Earth Sciences, who’s research shakes up our understanding of the Earth’s chemistry – right to the core.

“For decades it has been assumed that the Earth had the same composition as the sun, as long the most volatile elements like hydrogen are excluded. This theory is based on the idea that everything in the solar system in general has the same composition. Since the sun comprises 99 per cent of the solar system, this composition is essentially that of the sun,” O’Neill said.

As it is easier to measure the chemical makeup of chondritic meteorites, planetary geologists have long used these to more precisely determine the sun’s composition – and therefore the composition of the Earth. From this, scientists have concluded that the Earth has a ‘chondritic’ composition.

Campbell said this thesis has been challenged again and again. “Recent discoveries have shown that the ratio of two of the rare earth elements in Earth’s volcanic rocks is higher than in chondritic meteorites. Many scientists have explained this by arguing that there must be a hidden reservoir of these elements near the centre of the Earth to balance this ratio out. This reservoir would also be enriched in the heat producing elements uranium, thorium and potassium,” he said.

Campbell spent twenty years researching mantle plumes – columns of hot rock that rise from the boundary of the Earth’s core and are the mechanism that removes heat from the Earth’s centre. “The problem with the idea of a hidden reservoir is that although these elements could be hidden we would be able to detect the heat they produce,” he said. “However, mantle plumes simply don’t release enough heat for these reservoirs to exist. As a consequence the Earth simply does not have the same composition as chondrites or the sun.”

O’Neill has developed an explanation as to why the Earth’s composition may differ from chondrites. “The Earth is thought to have formed by collision of planetary bodies of increasing size. In our research we suggest that by the time these planetary bodies had reached a moderate size they developed an outer shell that contained a significant amount of heat producing elements,” he said. “During the final stages of the Earth’s formation this outer shell was lost by a process called ‘collisional erosion’. This produced an Earth that has fewer heat producing elements than chondritic meteorites, which explains why the Earth doesn’t have the same chemical composition as chondritic meteorites.”

Tamworth built on rock ‘n’ roll

Tamworth is famous as the home of Australian country music. But 350 million years ago, some hardcore rock n roll was also happening. Scientists from the Research School of Earth Sciences have discovered that granites in the New England area near Tamworth were produced by a remarkable process, whereby the magmas erupted from volcanoes turned to mud, then back to magma again, in a very rapid cycle.

PhD student Heejin Jeon said 350 million years ago, while much of the world was geologically stable, the country capital was all shook up. “For about 50 million years, a chain of volcanoes erupted thick piles of ash and lava into a shallow sea near the edge of the Australian continent,” Jeon said. “Over time, the ash and lava turned into a massive pile of sediment that soon became buried so deeply that it began to melt. This melted sediment then rose towards the surface as molten magma, forming the granite rock formations, now exposed between Tamworth and Texas in Queensland.”

“By using oxygen isotopes to distinguish between minerals crystallised when the granites intruded, and volcanic minerals trapped in the granite, then dating both, we have shown that this cycle was unexpectedly fast. Within only 15 million years the volcanic sediments were buried to a depth of about 20km, and the Earth’s heat caused them to melt. Five million years later this magma had risen back to the Earth’s surface, making the granites we see today. This is an extremely fast process. This discovery has helped us gain a much better understanding of how those granites formed. It is important in helping us unravel the geological history of New England.”

The discovery has been published in the international journal, Earth & Planetary Science Letters.

Book review – Role Models

Originally published in FUSE Online, 21 March 2012 (http://www.fusemagazine.com.au/index.php/regulars/op-ed/2217-role-models-by-john-waters)

When we think of role models we think of sports hero, rock stars and Hollywood hunks.

But, how about having a porn star as your role model? Or an alcoholic, verbally abusive owner of a local bar? Or, how about a member of the Manson family? For most people it would seem a ridiculous proposition, but for John Waters these are, amongst many others the very people he considers to be his role models. In Waters new book, ‘Role Models’, he takes readers through the stories of the people he considers to be his Role Models.

For those who are unfamiliar with Waters (and unfortunately if you read the book, you only get little insights into his life and career), he is a queer, cult hero. Waters is most famous for his work in movies, with his major successes being ‘Pink Flamingos’ and ‘Hairspray’. Waters also has an illustrious career in writing and other art forms – something that has made him a hero in queer, movie and art circles around the world.

divine

( IMAGE: Pink Flamingos is a 1972 transgressive black comedy film written, produced, composed, shot, edited, and directed by John Waters.^[1] When the film was initially released, it caused a huge degree of controversy due to the wide range of perverse acts performed in explicit detail. It has since become one of the most notorious films ever made. It made an underground star of the flamboyant drag queen actor, Divine.)

In his new book, Waters takes a look at his own life and the characters that he has been surrounded by in throughout his life. The book takes you on a journey through a range of different stories, where Waters looks at the lives of each of the people who have shaped his life. These people are as diverse as they are interesting – they range from famous author Tennessee Williams, musician Stevie Wonder and fashion icon Rei Kawakubo to the more obscure, such as porn star Bobby Garcia, member of the Manson Family Leslie Van Houten and members of his community in Baltimore, bar owners Esther Martin.

Through each of these stories, Waters provides an engaging and entertaining narrative about the people who have shaped his life. And it is in this narrative that the real story behind Role Models develops. What Waters does is show that the people we may not normally consider to be worthy of being our Role Models can in fact be inspirations. Take Leslie Van Houten for example. In describing his relationship with this infamous member of the Manson family, Waters takes readers on a journey of a woman, who although once committed a heinous crime, is a kind, caring person who is suffering more than she deserves.

And that is what is great about the book. Waters manages to challenge how we think about role models in our society. Yet, it is in this analysis that Waters book can be criticised. Whilst engaging, the book is simply a collection of stories, and it lacks much of an overarching narrative. We don’t see an analysis of either the role of role models in shaping Waters and his work, nor as to why this work provides an interesting analysis to the world Waters lives in.

John_Waters_2

Simply put, it is hard to know why Waters wrote the book – was it to challenge our ideas of Role Models, or simply to provide an interesting collection of stories? I think the value of Waters’ book clearly lies in the former, but it is unfortunate that he doesn’t make that step and provide an overarching analysis to this work.

Despite this however, Role Models, is an engaging, and extraordinarily interesting work. Waters is a clear, concise and interesting author who writes with wit and charm. For anyone interested in the life of this cult hero, the idea of role models and hero idolisation in our society or just want to read an engaging novel, Water’s book is definitely worth the read.

Rating: 4 stars

Role Models is availabe at good book stores or at :http://www.amazon.com

Born this way?

Originally published in FUSE, March 2012

“I understand that for many people it’s not, but for me it’s a choice, and you don’t get to define my gayness for me.”

This is what Cynthia Nixon, best known for her role as Miranda in Sex and the City, and a woman who spent fifteen years in a relationship with a man, but is now engaged to a woman, recently said to The New York Times Magazine.

The response has been amazing. Wayne Bensen, of Truth Wins Out, for example stated:

“Cynthia did not put adequate thought into the ramifications of her words…When people say it’s a choice, they are green-lighting an enormous amount of abuse because if it’s a choice, people will try to influence and guide young people to what they perceive as the right choice.”

Blogger Perez Hilton responded by saying:

We totally hear her out and true, we cannot define her “gayness,” but it wasn’t a choice for us. We were BORN gay. And millions of gay people around the world feel the same way.

These responses are part of an idea in the queer movement that we need to fight back against the idea that sexuality is a choice. The defense, based on the idea that if sexuality is solely biological then it makes it harder to discriminate against us, has become engrained in mainstream queer activism. As the reaction to Nixon shows however, it is an idea that is having serious negative effects on the queer movement.

Sexuality is about much more than biology. Sexuality discusses identification, both collectively and individually, as well as how we act as sexual agents in society. As sexual agents, we all make a range of choices, whether it is coming out, participating in relationships, identifying in a particular way or engaging in sexual acts. It is access to these sorts of choices that is central to the idea of queer liberation.

When we deny any form of sexual choices therefore, we not only isolate those who speak actively about their choices (such as Cynthia Nixon), but we also actively remove agency around our sexuality. When we say things like, “it’s not a choice, why would we want to choose this?” what we’re actually saying is ‘we don’t want to be like this, but we have no ability to change it’. We have no sexual agency.

As we demand that sexuality is only biological, we make it easier for our opponents to fight against true sexual liberation, where we all have the ability to make active sexual choices. This pushes us into accepting labels, once again placed on us from those with power in the community, once again taking away our ability to make active choices about how we identify ourselves.

Sexuality is as much about identity as it is our biological urges. Identification is essential to our sexual agency and targeting those who speak publicly about the sexual choices they make is simply not acceptable. As Cynthia Nixon also stated:

A certain section of our community is very concerned that it not be seen as a choice, because if it’s a choice, then we could opt out. I say it doesn’t matter if we flew here or we swam here, it matters that we are here and we are one group and let us stop trying to make a litmus test for who is considered gay and who is not.

Instead of saying ‘why would we want to choose this?’ let’s start saying, ‘of course we would choose this, being queer is awesome.’ That’s the response of a movement fighting for the ability to be true sexual agents in society.

Reach for the stars with a SkyMapper Internship

Originally published in ANU On Campus, March 2 2012

Sudents have the chance to explore the Universe with an internship in one of the world’s most exciting astronomical research projects, SkyMapper.

Over the next few years the SkyMapper telescope will be used to map the southern sky to unprecedented depth. Astronomers will be able to explore space from the Milky Way to the edge of the optically-observable Universe. New asteroids, comets, pulsating stars and distant galaxies powered by black holes will be seen for the first time.

The Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, in conjunction with the ANU College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, is offering a limited number of internship opportunities in the SkyMapper team to second and third year students with a passion for astronomy. The internship includes a $5,000 educational stipend. Applications close 16 March 2012.

For more information visit http://www.mso.anu.edu.au/skymapper/Internships

End the cynicism and start demanding better

Published at ABC The Drum on 29 February 2011

I recently saw the film The Ides of March. For those of you who haven’t seen it, the basic story (without any spoilers) follows Stephen Meyers (Ryan Gosling), who is the junior campaign manager for a Democrat candidate for the United States president, Mike Morris (George Clooney). Morris is an idealistic progressive (think Barack Obama) who is locked in battle for the Democratic nomination with Arkansas politician Ted Pullman.

To cut a long story short, the movie follows Morris and Meyer’s inevitable corruption as they lose their ideals to make the necessary dirty deals to ensure that Morris gets the nomination.

Sitting through the movie I found it a rather enjoyable portrayal of American politics. This is a position that has been held by many critics of the film, with many describing it as eerily realistic. Yet, as I have thought about the film more since I’ve seen it, I have slowly become somewhat frustrated with the message it is selling.

You see, for me, The Ides of March, is not just a portrayal of the way the American political system operates, it also acts as a portrayal of the inherent way politics works. Coming from the movie, it is very easy to get the message that no matter how good or how idealistic someone is, they will always be corrupted by politics and power.

Looking at our politics today it is pretty easy to see that our community is taking a similar world view. It’s pretty easy to understand why as well. Just looking at the mess that is the current Labor leadership, and the negativity of the Coalition, politics is looking like a very dirty business at the moment.

Yet, what is surprising is that despite our dislike for many of our politicians we seem to have become so cynical that we simply accept this as the natural way. We see fighting between Rudd and Gillard and we say that that is what all politicians are like and that’s what they’re always going to be like. We’ve become so cynical that we ignore the good things and don’t fight against the bad.

You may want to call me naive or idealistic, but I simply don’t want to accept this. Whilst I see the bad things about our current politics, I also see a lot of good, and a lot of potential; but only if we grasp it.

Amongst all the infighting and backstabbing there are politicians, from all parties, who are actually working to create real change. There are many politicians who actually do care and we shouldn’t let these people suffer from the actions of others.

Beyond this however, the great thing about a democracy is that we get to decide who sits in our Parliament and who doesn’t. If we see politicians that we don’t like, who are not focused on the community, we get to kick them out. At an even higher level, if we really think our system is corrupt we also have the power to change it. Sometimes this may be difficult, with big powers often standing in our way. Yet, when we think about it, politics is about the way our whole society works and how our resources are distributed, so isn’t this a fight worth having?

John Acton was famously reported to state, “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely”. It’s a statement that has dominated much of our thought about power and politics. Yet, it is rarely known that when Acton made that statement, he actually said “power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely”. Instead of saying that power is inherently corrupting, what he was saying was that we must be wary of power and ensure we keep it in check. This is what democracy is all about in many ways.

It is time for us to stop seeing politics as all bad. Whilst we are right to be unhappy about the fighting between Rudd and Gillard and the negativity of the Coalition, that doesn’t mean we have to accept it. As a community, if we want better, we can demand it. Instead of just standing there and saying ‘what another dirty politician’, it’s time to stand up and say ‘that’s not good enough’.

There is plenty you can do. You can get involved in political parties to challenge the dirty politics of old. You can decide to support candidates who are willing and ready to make a difference, or you can run to change things yourself. You can send letters to newspapers or call in to radio stations demanding better. Or, you can get involved in social movements demanding change. There are so many people out there, whether on the left or the right, wanting something different and working towards it. You can join them.

It is time for us to stop being cynical and start demanding better.

Marriage focus ignores other issues

Originally published in the Sydney Star Observer (online), 23 February 2012

Imagine for a moment this scenario.

Let’s say you’re a young man living in conservative rural Australia. As you grow older you begin to realise you’re attracted to other men. Expected to stay in the family business for the rest of your life, your sexuality now becomes a major issue.

You know that if you come out, you will be kicked out, and with no higher education or future employment prospects it is a risk you can’t take.

For you, your only options are to spend the rest of your life hiding your sexuality or to simply end it all.

It is tragic realities such as this that are faced by too many, which is why young gay men are 3.7 times more likely to attempt suicide than their heterosexual counterparts — a figure that increases for same-sex attracted women and even more for bisexual people and trans* people.

Or let’s think of another scenario.

Imagine you’re trans*. Throughout your entire life you have faced discrimination for your gender identity. Now, unemployed, you continue to find it almost impossible to find work, mostly because of the discrimination you face because of your gender identity.

If this is you, you are one of the approximate 9 percent of Australian trans* people who are unemployed today (statistics are from 2008, with this number being more than double the national average at the time).

Stories such as this are too common for my liking.

Trans*, gay, lesbian, bi, intersex, asexual and queer people face a range of different and varied forms of discrimination every day. As a young gay man, I have seen this sort of discrimination firsthand.

It is for this reason that the global queer movement formed. Queer members of our society decided it was time for these injustices to come to an end and for our community to gain its liberation.

Yet, as the queer movement evolves, so many of these stories are being untold. Despite the fact my story as a young, white, middle class queer man is being told, many queer people are still without a voice.

The mainstream queer movement (i.e. the big organisations with the big money) have become focused around a predominately middle to upper class queer agenda. The movement has moved away from queer liberation, to instead focus on allowing a few, special members of the queer community to gain access to the heteropatriarchal society.

For example, for years now the queer movement has become solely focused on a few single goals — mainly those of civil unions and marriage ‘rights’.

Marriage equality has become an all-consuming activity.

Instead of fighting for queer liberation as a whole, we have become obsessed with accessing heteropatriarchal relationship systems. Our queer organisations have now been replaced with those such as Australian Marriage Equality, who are dominating political space. It is now almost impossible to read anything about queer liberation without it being about marriage equality.

And with all of this focus on marriage equality, many other issues have begun to fall by the wayside. Marriage equality has become an all-consuming part of the queer agenda, sucking all oxygen in the broader public space away from a broader discussion on queer liberation.

For example, the organiser of a marriage rights forum (@ToroProduction & @CosmicRami), which featured Kristina Keneally, had this to say to a concerned member of the community:
katedoak Kate Doak: @ ToroProduction Question: Is tonight only on marriage #equality, or are you guys planning on debating other #lgbt issues? cc @KKeneally
_ToroProduction Randel Morris: @katedoak focused on marriage equality tonight, but have lots of LGBT issues we will be fighting for soon! #equality #lgbt
katedoak Kate Doak: @ToroProduction Before or after marriage #equality passes? High #lgbt youth unemployment levels = more pressing than marriage @KKeneally
CosmicRami Rami Social & Mobile: @ katedoak Def. an Issue we wish to discuss down the track, we will be raising that point in a separate future forum 🙂 #equality #lgbt

The message here is clear. Marriage equality is the biggest issue we need to deal — others can wait.

Even when the queer movement does move beyond marriage equality, the campaigns and victories still have a middle class feeling to them. For example, there was a recent (and important) victory over gender identification on passports, which meant that people will no longer have to have gender reassignment surgery before they change their gender on their passport.

When it occurred, this victory was held up by many around the country, who proudly stated “Look, we can focus on marriage equality and still have important victories in other areas”. What this analysis fails to recognise was that it was a victory that was due almost solely to the work of trans* activists, with very little mainstream queer involvement.

Beyond this, the changes still have a very middle class feel to them. Changes to passports do very little for those trans* people who are still unemployed. It is also only those who are wealthy enough to be able to travel who can access passports and gain the benefits of the gender identification changes implemented.

For many, the campaigns the mainstream queer movement are focusing on mean nothing. Marriage means nothing if you can’t even face coming out. A passport is useless if you can’t get a job and therefore can’t afford to travel.

For many, the issues are so much bigger and the problems so much worse.

While we, upper to middle class queers, fight for marriage ‘rights’, there are those who still can’t come out in their community because of discrimination. There are those who commit suicide because they cannot face the homophobia in their community. There are those who cannot get a job because of discrimination they face from potential employers.

There are so many stories that are far more harrowing than someone being unable to get married that simply aren’t being addressed.

I am a gay, white, middle class Canberran in a long-term stable relationship. I am the epitome of the type of person who is likely to benefit from a change to the Marriage Act.

Yet, even as I see this coming closer, I continue to become more and more disillusioned with a queer movement that is becoming so narrow that it is excluding the very people it should be empowering.

Searching for solutions

Originally published in ANU Reporter, 14 February 2012.

Collaborative research is helping to shed light on how to close the gap on Indigenous health disadvantage, writes SIMON COPLAND.

We hear a lot about ‘closing the gap’ between Indigenous and non-Indigenous health outcomes. With a 12-year difference in life expectancy between non-Indigenous and Indigenous males, and child mortality rates up to four times higher in Indigenous communities, Indigenous disadvantage is considered to be one of Australia’s biggest health problems.

But what we often don’t hear about is the gap between Indigenous people who live in rural areas and Indigenous people who live in urban areas.

Indigenous people living in urban areas have the lion’s share of many conditions affecting Indigenous communities, including around 60 per cent of the burden of cardiovascular disease, diabetes cases and cancers, as well as a staggering 83 per cent of mental health issues.

Despite this, only 10 per cent of research in Indigenous health focuses on urban communities. For Professor Emily Banks, a researcher at the National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, this means a significant lack of data to help find solutions to these health problems.

That’s a gap that a team of researchers, including Banks, working with Aboriginal communities and Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services, are working to close. This collaboration has recently been awarded $2.5 million in funding through the Australian Primary Health Care Research Institute to establish the Centre for Research Excellence in Urban Aboriginal Child Health.

The project builds on a research program called SEARCH – the Study of Environment on Aboriginal Resilience and Child Health. It calls on Banks’ experience in epidemiology – the study of the distribution of diseases – that began very early in her career.

“Most of my immediate family are scientists, so I just assumed that I would be a scientist. I decided to do a medical degree and by about my third year in I started to get interested in epidemiology.

“What I found was that when I started working in hospitals I noticed a lot of people asking ‘why isn’t someone talking to me about why I got sick?’ Questions about the underlying causes of a person’s illness were often left unanswered.

“I felt epidemiology was the best way to answer some of these questions.”

Banks’ interest in answering these questions has led her to work on large long-term health studies. She was part of the research team on The Million Women Study in the United Kingdom, which found a significant increase in risk of breast cancer in women using hormone replacement therapy; and is the Scientific Director of the 45 and Up Study in Australia, which has collected health data on 267,000 men and women aged 45 and over in New South Wales.

She says she enjoys the challenge of identifying important trends in large groups.

“I’ve always found, for the particular work I do, that you need to make a really big investment in building collaborations and gathering data on a lot of people. That lays the foundation for an in-depth understanding in the long term,” she says.

“I came back to Australia to translate the work I did on large cohort studies in the United Kingdom. That’s why we started the 45 and Up Study.

“At the same time, however, I really wanted to contribute to the major public health issues facing the country and that includes Aboriginal health.”

SEARCH, which is the first large-scale study into the health and well-being of Aboriginal children living in urban communities in New South Wales, was born out of a partnership between researchers and Aboriginal communities.

Sharon Nicholson-Rogers is the Aboriginal Study Manager of SEARCH. She says that the project is a collaborative, community-led initiative.

“SEARCH grew out of the Coalition for Research to Improve Aboriginal Health, CRIAH, which is a collaboration between the Aboriginal Health and Medical Research Council and the Sax Institute. CRIAH conducted an extensive community consultation process asking Indigenous communities in New South Wales what sort of research they wanted to see,”says Nicholson-Rogers.

“The community wanted research that followed people in the long term, and which focused on children – their families and their environment. So an individual focus, but one which produced a much more holistic picture.

“What the communities really wanted was the opposite of fly-in/fly-out research. They wanted something that was committed to the long term, so a full picture of the health issues facing the community could be developed. The communities also identified priority health issues, like ear health and social and mental wellbeing.”

Professor Banks adds that a key part of SEARCH is that it is community initiated and responds to community priorities.

“Aboriginal Data Collection Officers will collect data about children at different Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Centres across the state. Aboriginal Knowledge Brokers will then work with the centres and community to identify targets for change and provide support to make those changes. That will really be a community initiated process.”

For Banks, doing it right requires a long-term focus.

“Although it takes a long time, it is the only way to achieve something meaningful and lasting for the community, and if that helps to close some of those gaps, then I know that we will have done our part of the job.”