Penelope Smith
The value of a Public Health Association of Australia (PHAA) membership, particularly if you are a student like me, is significant; but for a very long time, my engagement with the Association was little to none.
Despite being a member since 2017, it’s only within the last year that I’ve realised how much meaning and value my membership can offer me – far beyond being a simple tax reduction.
For many years, my membership for the PHAA would come up in June. This was intentionally designed around the submission of my tax return in July, which in my mind meant my membership was essentially free.
Despite the ever-wise David Morgan, previous Chief Operations Officer of the Lowitja Institute and previous Chief Executive Officer of Ramahyuck ACCHO, telling me many times it wasn’t as simple as that, I continued to pretend that my membership didn’t really cost me anything.
When I left my public health academic role at Australian Catholic University to explore if I was a good fit in the not-for-profit sector, I kept paying my membership based on this system. Beyond paying my membership, my engagement was little to none.
When my colleague and dear friend Dr Alana Gall (Truwulway woman, North East Coast of Lutruwita) was approached and accepted the opportunity to be the next Vice President (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) of the PHAA, I began to look at my membership very differently.
It was prior to the Voice referendum, and I felt very challenged as a non-Indigenous person of colour to overtly demonstrate my commitment to my values of decolonisation and anti-racism.
The decision for Alana to take on this role was complex.
Alana was (and still is) a busy early career researcher, overloaded with opportunities that were always presented as a ‘chance that would never come again’.
She has a deep commitment to her community and her family that she honours above all. She is a mother, a sister, a daughter, an aunty and a friend. There isn’t much free time.
I was on her Country, Lutruwita (Tasmania), when we discussed her choice. In this conversation, as I walked next to Kanamaluka (the Tamar River), I promised her that I would give her support should she take on the role.
After the referendum, this support for Alana felt even more important. It was time for non-Indigenous people like me to step back and provide tangible, practical support for First Nations people and consider how we go forward with them.
At the Australian Public Health Conference in Nipuluna (Hobart) last year, the PHAA Board and membership gave their support for the First Nations Collective and preceding co-design project, to embed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voices into the Association’s decision-making processes.
Alana and I were thrilled and spent time discussing the next steps.
We identified that the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Special Interest Group was a key committee within PHAA who could support our work.
Alana and I didn’t have a relationship with the two co-convenors, at the time Dr Joanne (Jo) Flavel and Dr Kristen Glenister, but we took the chance to meet with them, hopeful that the values of their group would match their smiling faces on the website.
I have since reflected on that meeting many times. How an afternoon Zoom conversation with these two women transformed so much for me individually, but also for the Collective Project.
In that meeting, both Jo and Kristen demonstrated their alliance to the PHAA values outlined in the current strategic plan: respect, inclusiveness, integrity, evidence and leadership.
They quickly offered support on the day and continue to do so.
They have helped me understand how my membership and my resulting roles and responsibilities can achieve my goals and that of the Collective Project.
They have taught me and Alana how the PHAA system can support the work of the Collective Project and introduced us to other members who can assist along the way.
All four of us are excited and hopeful about the work that the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Special Interest Group, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Special Interest Group, and The Collective will undertake together.
Being a PHAA member is more than opportunities to attend closed events, discounts on conference attendance, and cheaper publication fees in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health.
For me, it is an avenue to demonstrate my commitment to decolonisation, sovereignty, and anti-racism in public health in a practical and tangible way.
Since Alana took on the role of Vice President and lead of the Collective Project, the role of my membership with PHAA has been transformed – no longer is it just a box in my tax return.
I have heard many people say that value of membership is about what you put in, how you step up and take part.
I’ve found that membership is about the interactions and connections, and collaborating with other members whose work may be different to mine, but to who I am united through shared values and purpose.
Penelope Smith is a sessional academic at Victoria University, PhD candidate at the University of Tasmania, and Project Manager of the First Nations Collective Co-Design Project.