Associate ProfessorSarah Bernays

I am a Level 3 supervisor at University of Sydney, with extensive supervision and mentorship responsibilities. I supervise a team of 15 researchers across Australia (5), Uganda (2), Vietnam (2) and Zimbabwe (7), both EMCRs and research assistants. I mentor 12 post-docs, four based at the University of Sydney (including one with a DECRA fellowship), one at LSHTM and seven at THRU Zim. I am a mentor within the CREATE PhD Fellowship programme (Wellcome Trust), Youth Research Academy (Zimbabwe) and SRH MSc at LSHTM. I have contributed to the creation and delivery of the Digital Health Academy for PhD students at LSHTM. 

Intrinsic to my approach is consistent demonstration of compassionate leadership through my teaching, research and supervision. I want to be part of equipping and building people up- colleagues, students, and community partners- to actively contribute and proudly share an advocacy platform.I am highly committed to ensuring that thoughtfulness and integrity are foremost in the way that I engage, conduct and support research. Part of this is reflected in a small project that I am undertaking in Zimbabwe to develop supervision and referall training and guidance which integrates emotional support for teams working in challenging conditions/ realities. This is to ensure that individuals are more consistently and appropriately supported to manage the emotional load of conducting research about sustained social injustice.  

My research is orientated towards impact for amplifying community voices. I have been the Zvandiri’s lead social scientist for ten years, an implementation partner operating at scale across Africa (identified by WHO as best practice for peer-delivered mental health). Developing youth peer-research capacity and input into large scale proposals, consideration as 2024 Finalist of 100&Change (MacArthur Foundation, US$100 million

grant).

Alongside more conventional research publications, I am invested in ensuring that the voices of those who may not conventionally included are heard, on their own terms, within the published literature. For example, I ahve been closely supporting young people in Zimbabwe to articulate their views and experiences, guiding them in each stage of the writing process (Maturu, L., et. al 2024. Come and learn: an invitation from Zvandiri Youth

Advocates. Lancet Child and Adolescent Health). 

To bring communities and decision-makers closer together I established two community advisory boards for TB- affected communities in Australia and Vietnam. I have initiated a virtual community of practice to strengthen capacity across a growing network connecting researchers and communities, including delivering special community session at the Union TB conference (2024). To share best practices and strengthen capacity, I am also driving an emerging community of practice across DFAT funded investments in the Pacific and advising other projects in their community-engagement implementation.

 International impact on policy: Invited member of WHO Adolescent HIV Service Delivery Global working group (since 2020). Technical advisor, WHO TB adolescent treatment guidelines development group (2021-2022). Invited expert panel member, WHO Global Guidelines STIs and Partner services (2022-3).