Thursday, 22nd May National Suicide Prevention Conference 2025

Nieves Murray - CEO Suicide Prevention Australia

• The Network Effect: Turning Connection into Protection in Suicide Prevention - Anthony Pisani

• Balancing Opportunities and Risks: Social Media for Suicide Prevention - Louise La Sala

• Learnlinc - Maximising your learning - Clayton Spence

• Inspiring change through a lived experience approach to adopting the Zero Suicide Framework  - Jezwyn Lapham and Shaina Serelson
• Hope in action - Michele Orr
• Developing a co-designed suicide prevention and response training package for lived experience workforce - Shaina Serelson

• The Time Has Come to Prove Community Suicide Prevention Training is Effective - Peter Gutierrez

• Suicide Safer Campuses: Creating networks that build capacity to support staff and students. - Bella Broadway and Jack Graham
• Murrumbidgee Local Response Group- A multiagency region-wide approach responding to tragedy.  - Emma Bromham
• Safe and structured lived experience engagement in suicide prevention education: Lessons from video-based programs - Dan Mobbs, Melanie Clark and Jay Gardener

• Understanding and optimising pathways for individuals in distress in the construction industry: data linkage study - Carla Meurk
• Defection from the social practice of gambling: A qualitative study of gambling-related suicide in Australia - Angela Rintoul
• Co-designing suicide prevention university education: A collaboration between Monash University and Roses in the Ocean - Kylie King, Nichola Parry and Caroline Allen

• Community-led approaches to wellbeing for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander LGBTQA+ young people - Shakara Liddelow-Hunt
• Suicide among current serving defence personnel in Australia: A retrospective mortality study  - Katherine Petrie
• Understanding lived emotion regulation experiences of individuals with a history of non-suicidal self-injury - Thomas Duncan-Plummer

• Young people’s perspectives on their mental health care: Implications for early intervention and suicide prevention - Kassandra Hon
• Harnessing the feed: Taking a social first approach to digital mental health service delivery - Annie Wylie
• Developing EDBridge: A brief contact intervention for adolescents at risk of suicide and their parents - Ruth Tatnell

Moderator:

Geraldine Mellet - Broadcast Journalist and Writer

Geraldine Mellet is a broadcast journalist and writer with over twenty-five years in radio and television. She has also worked as a public health and disability advocate, including contributing to Australia’s recent vaping legislation and the original campaign to get the NDIS legislated and funded. More recently she coordinated and filmed The Lives We Lead social media project featuring the skills, talents and work stories of sixty West Australians with disabilities, in their own words. After 19 months as Co-CEO of ACOSH (the Australian Council on Smoking and Health) she resigned to complete her debut novel which is being published in 2026.

Panellists:

Jacqueline McGowan-Jones - Commissioner for Children and Young People WA

Jacqueline McGowan-Jones began her appointment as Commissioner for Children and Young People in January 2022. 

She has an extensive background in education, child protection, Indigenous affairs, and suicide postvention. Her experience includes senior executive roles across state and federal governments, and the non-government sector.

As Commissioner, Jacqueline has a statutory responsibility to monitor, protect and advocate for the rights and wellbeing of all Western Australian children and young people.

A crucial function of the Commissioner is to consult with children and young people, prioritising the needs and interests of Aboriginal children and young people, as well as those from vulnerable and disadvantaged backgrounds, to address issues that directly impact their lives.

The Commissioner is committed to strengthening the systems that improve opportunities available to all children and young people. She firmly believes that all young people have a right to be heard, and actively works to foster a heightened level of understanding and engagement in matters that affect our children and young people, giving them a stronger voice and advocating for their needs.

Tama Leaver - Curtin University 

Tama Leaver (PhD) is a Professor of Internet Studies at Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia; a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child; a past President of the Association of Internet Researchers (AoIR); and a regular media commentator. His current research includes examining the impact of datafication and artificial intelligence on children and childhoods. He is the author of Artificial Culture: Identity, Technology and Bodies (Routledge, 2012); co-editor of An Education in Facebook? Higher Education and the World’s Largest Social Network (Routledge, 2014) with Mike Kent; and Social, Casual and Mobile Games: The Changing Gaming Landscape (Bloomsbury Academic, 2016) with Michele Willson; co-author of Instagram: Visual Social Media Cultures (Polity, 2020) with Tim Highfield and Crystal Abidin; co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Digital Media and Children (Routledge, 2021) with  Lelia Green, Donell Holloway, Kylie Stevenson and Leslie Haddon; and co-editor of Gaming Disability: Disability Perspectives on Contemporary Video Games (Routledge, 2023) with Katie Ellis and Mike Kent. He has received teaching awards from the University of Western Australia, and Curtin University, and in 2012 received a national Australian Award for Teaching Excellence in the Humanities and the Arts. His main web presence is www.tamaleaver.net.

Dr Louise La Sala - Orygen

Dr Louise La Sala is a Research Fellow at Orygen, Centre for Youth Mental Health at the University of Melbourne. Her research is focused on youth self-harm and suicide prevention, with a specific interest in the impact of social media on the mental health and wellbeing of young people.

Dr La Sala is a lead researcher on the #chatsafe program which aims to provide young people, educators, and families with the tools to communicate safely online about self-harm and suicide. Her work investigates the complex relationship between social media and youth mental health, and she brings unique expertise in developing effective strategies to promote online safety and prevent self-harm and suicide among young people. Her work has informed online safety and suicide prevention policy at both a national and international level and she regularly works with popular social media platforms and online safety bodies to promote safe online environments for young people.

Dr La Sala is a member of the International Association for Youth Mental Health, International Association of Suicide Prevention, Society for Mental Health Research and International Early Intervention and Prevention in Mental Health Association. She also sits on a Special Global Taskforce for the Prevention of Self-harm and Suicide in Women and Girls.

Carla Sargeant, National Operations Manager Headspace Schools & Communities

Carla Sargeant holds qualifications in Psychology, Juvenile Justice, Youth Work, Community Development and Secondary Education. In Carla’s role as the National Operations Manager for headspace’s Schools & Communities Division she leads the national Mental Health Education Program, Community Critical Incident Response Initiative, University Support Program, National Training and the New South Wales Response and Recovery Team. Carla has a diverse range of experience in the mental health industry which includes community-led co-design, extreme weather events community response and recovery programs, responding to community high impact critical incidents, counselling, adventure-based learning, art therapy, community engagement and student wellbeing programs.

• Poster Awards - David Bruce – Community Adult Co-Director at North Metropolitan Health Service
• Conference Closing - Nieves Murray – CEO, Suicide Prevention Australia