What have we been up to?

Laura Navarro
Australian Academy of Science
@navlala

Submissions to Government

The EMCR Forum Executive partnered with the Australian Brain Alliance EMCR Network to prepare a submission to the Productivity Commission's inquiry into the effect of mental health. The submission focuses on issues that come under ‘mentally healthy workplaces’ and you can read it here.

Thank you to the 112 EMCRs who had their say in the survey, your responses helped inform the findings and recommendations of the submission. And a special thanks Dr Kristen Wilson, a postdoctoral researcher in neuroscience from the Australian National University, for volunteering to help us analyse the results of the survey, your contributions were highly valuable.

Kristen got in touch with us through emcr@science.org.au to volunteer her time to help with this submission. If you are ever interested to contribute to anything the Forum does, don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Science at the Shine Dome 2019

If you have kept an eye on the e-updates in the past weeks then you will know that Science at the Shine Dome 2019 will feature a dedicated EMCR engagement program. This is an opportunity for the EMCRs attending the three-day meeting to get to engage and network with their peers from day one of the event.

This year, the EMCR Forum Executive will facilitate an EMCR masterclass on work–life management on 28 May. There will also be an EMCR networking dinner on that evening, and the EMCR professional development workshops on the last day of the event. In addition to all this there will be ample opportunities to network with Fellows of the Academy and other VIPs. We would like to acknowledge and say a big thank you to UniBank for supporting the EMCR engagement activities at Science at the Shine Dome this year.

If you are interested in joining the event and the EMCR engagement program, we invite you to check out the opportunities available for your workplace to support your attendance.

Face-to-face meeting

The EMCR Forum Executive Committee held its annual meeting in Canberra on 20 and 21 February. The meeting was an opportunity to welcome the new executive members to the team and get them up to speed with the activities of the executive.

During the two days the executive reviewed its strategic plan in order to start the groundwork for a new plan in 2020 and set the priorities for its activities in 2019, which include the promotion of good mental health, kindness in science, work–life balance and career flexibility for EMCRs.