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Professor Jackie Curtis was appointed inaugural Executive Director in April 2020. She is a psychiatrist and was previously the Clinical Director of Youth Mental Health at the South Eastern Sydney Local Health District. Her research and clinical work over several decades has focused on early psychosis and youth mental health, including improving the cardiometabolic health of people living with serious mental disorders such as schizophrenia, with the aim of reducing health inequalities and increasing life expectancy. Jackie developed and implemented the internationally recognised Keeping the Body in Mind program, demonstrating that antipsychotic-induced weight gain can be prevented with lifestyle intervention, and is the co-founder and Co-Chair of the iphYs international working group advocating for improved physical health for youth experiencing psychosis. An invited committee member of the World Health Organisation working group for the international guidelines: management of physical health conditions in adults with severe mental disorders, Dr Curtis is also a Conjoint Professor in the School of Psychiatry at UNSW Sydney.

Professor Raghu Lingam is Professor in Paediatric Population Health at the University of NSW, Honorary Professor at the Black Dog Institute and a Consultant Community Paediatrician in the Sydney Children’s Hospital Network. He established and leads the Population Child Health Research group at UNSW and co-leads the Kids to Adults clinical academic group as part of Sydney Partnership for Health, Education, Research and Enterprise (SPHERE).

Professor Lingam’s expertise is in the development of health services interventions that are evaluated at scale; he has run randomised controlled trials in the Australia, UK, India, Pakistan, Uganda, and Mozambique. He co-leads the Children and Young Peoples’ Health Partnership (CYPHP) a health systems transformation initiative for over 120,000 children in London based around a primary care-based learning health system.  Over the last 5 years he has attracted more than £11.5million of UK research funding from the UK National Institute for Health and Care Research, the World Bank, and national charity and Government funding. In Australia he has attracted more than $7 million of research funding over the last two years.

Rose Singh is a Research Project Officer with experience in quantitative and qualitative research methodologies.

In her role as a mental health peer worker, Ms Singh provides peer support to clients, helping young people develop and capitalise on their resilience and individual strengths, advocate for their voice in recovery, improve their quality of life in line with their values and advocate for equity, resources, supports and quality of care. She specialises in keeping young people who experience mental health issues connected with education.

Ms Singh holds a Bachelor of International Relations, Politics and History from the Australian National University and is qualified in primary education. She has also completed a Certificate IV in Mental Health Peer Work from the NSW Mental Health Coordinating Council.

Dr Hodgins is a Senior Research Associate at the School of Women’s and Children’s Health at UNSW. His research experience reflects a keen interest in qualitative methods and knowledge translation. He has more than eight years’ experience conducting qualitative research in healthcare, with a specific passion for arts-based and innovative methodologies. This work has included exploring health priorities and knowledge translation in community-based palliative care, knowledge translation in youth health, the delivery of mental health services to rural populations, and the evaluation of health implementation initiatives. He holds a PhD from Western Sydney University, and a Masters in Qualitative Health Research at The University of Sydney.