New member of the Suicide Prevention Council
Professor Ben Wadham has been appointed to the South Australian Suicide Prevention Council for a term of three years.
As a veteran, Professor Wadham has focused on the health and wellbeing of serving personnel and veterans for more than 22 years, including supporting veterans with lived experience of suicide.
A social researcher specialising in military culture, he examines institutional abuse within the ADF, veteran suicidality and military to civil transition. His work combines ethnographic depth with policy intervention to shepherd veterans toward thriving, meaningful civilian lives.
Professor Wadham’s Open Door Initiative recently co-hosted a national symposium, in partnership with Women Veterans Australia exploring how language influences institutional responses to sexual violence in the ADF.
He has also spoken to several media outlets this week about issues relating to veteran’s welfare: ABC TV News , ABC NewsRadio, and ABC Darwin.
Women in STEM appear on silos
Flinders University’s STEM Enrichment Academy and leading women in STEM featured on a video projected onto silos and buildings across the state last month.
Entitled Bright Minds, the special screenings in Wallaroo, Port Pirie, Quorn and Victor Harbor, commencing during National Science Week last month, includes an update with Professor Sarah Harmer on the CRC TiME (Transformations in Mining Economies) remediation of mine waste research at Flinders University.
As the Wallaroo silo screenings continuing this month, Professor Harmer says the large-scale experiments at Bedford Park are progressing well.
Fossil bones in Government House
Associate Professor Trevor Worthy, Carey Burke and PhD candidate Jacob Blokland helped prepare a special exhibition for South Australia’s Government House. The Flinders University contribution features an articulated skeleton of a rare extinct Genyornis (‘giant thunder bird’) from the major fossil site at Lake Callabonna. It will be on loan for about six months.
It will be shown along side an exhibition featuring a collection of ancient fossils and minerals “celebrating South Australia’s rich mineralogical and palaeontological heritage.” More information can be found on the Governor of SA website.
The next Government House Open Day will be held on Sunday, 12 October, from 10am to 2pm, in conjunction with the South Australia’s Nature Festival. The public is welcome to attend.