Our Staff
Professor Andrea Carson
Andrea Carson is a Professor of Political Communication and incoming Director of the Centre for Advancing Journalism at the University of Melbourne. She is an award-winning political scientist and journalist (The Age and ABC). Her research examines the media ecosystem and its impact on democracy, and she advises governments, think tanks and platforms. She was a research fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford and has extensively published and taught on investigative journalism, misinformation, election campaigns, and gender equality. She is a fellow of the Women’s Leadership Institute Australia and served as President of the Australian Political Studies Association.
Email: carsona@unimelb.edu.au
Professor Andrew Dodd
Andrew Dodd is Director of the Centre for Advancing Journalism. He was a broadcaster at ABC Radio National, where he presented several programs and founded the long running Media Report program. He was a reporter at ABC TV's 7.30 Report and a media and business reporter at The Australian newspaper. He has also worked for Crikey.com.au and Radio Netherlands and written for several other publications. Andrew teaches Researching and Writing Stories; his latest book is Upheaval: Disrupted Lives in Journalism.
Email: adodd@unimelb.edu.au
@andrewcdodd
Associate Professor Louisa Lim
Louisa Lim is an award-winning journalist and podcaster. Her most recent book Indelible City; Dispossession and Defiance in Hong Kong was shortlisted for the Stella Prize, the Walkley Award and the Prime Minister's Literary Award for Non-fiction, and won a Citation from the Overseas Press Club of America. She teaches audio journalism and podcasting, and her podcast, The Little Red Podcast, has won the Australian Podcast Award for news and current affairs. She is currently the Saturday Paper's podcast critic, and her journalism can also be read at the New York Times and the Guardian.
Email: louisa.lim@unimelb.edu.au
@limlouisa
Lucy Smy
Lucy Smy is a Senior Lecturer specialising in business journalism. She is a former Financial Times journalist and has reported from Germany, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia and the Czech Republic. She co-ordinates International Traditions in Journalism, International Business Journalism and Global Crisis Reporting.
Email: lucy.smy@unimelb.edu.au
Jo Chandler
Jo Chandler is an award-winning journalist and Editor of the Centre for Advancing Journalism’s flagship publication The Citizen. She is also a Senior Lecturer and coordinates the Newsroom and Investigative Journalism subjects in the Master of Journalism and Master of International Journalism programs.
Email: jchandler@unimelb.edu.au
🦋 @jochandler.bsky.social
Liam Cochrane
Liam Cochrane is Lecturer in Video Journalism. He was previously the ABC’s South-East Asia correspondent, based in Bangkok, travelling the Asia Pacific region filing for television, radio and digital platforms across the ABC. Liam teaches the subjects Journalism Project and Video Journalism.
Email: liam.cochrane@unimelb.edu.au
@Liam_Cochrane
Dr Jeff Sparrow
Dr Jeff Sparrow is Senior Lecturer in the Centre for Advancing Journalism and teaches the Non Fiction Writing, Change in Journalism and Journalism Thesis subjects in the Master of Journalism and Master of International Journalism programs. He is also a writer, editor, broadcaster and Walkley award-winning journalist. He is a former columnist for Guardian Australia, a former Breakfaster at Melbourne's 3RRR, and a past editor of Overland literary journal. His recent books include Provocations: New and Selected Writing and Crimes Against Nature: Capitalism and Global Heating. He is a visiting scholar at the State Library of NSW.
Email: jeffrey.sparrow@unimelb.edu.au
@Jeff_Sparrow
Dr Silvia Montaña-Niño
Dr Nicholas Payne
Dr Nicholas Payne is co-coordinator of the Centre for Advancing Journalism's Key Skills subject. He is an award-winning former print/online journalist and media relations and corporate communications professional, with experience in metro, regional, and local community newsrooms. His areas of research interest and specialisation include investigative journalism, feature writing, environment and climate change communication, and journalism ethics.
Email: n.payne@unimelb.edu.au
Tania Lee
Tania Lee co-ordinates Current Issues in Finance and is a journalist who has more than 10 years' experience as a reporter, digital producer and video journalist in China and Australia. Tania has worked for the ABC, The Age, Wall Street Journal, Agence France Presse, Reuters and China Daily. She is currently a digital content editor with SBS Chinese.
Email: tania.lee1@unimelb.edu.au
Sami Shah
Sami Shah is a multi-award winning writer, journalist and comedian. He coordinates New Media: Harnessing Digital Disruption in the Master of Journalism and Master of International Journalism programs. Sami writes for a variety of international and local media including The New York Times, Dawn and Times of India.
Email: sami.shah@unimelb.edu.au
@samishah
Gina McColl
Gina McColl is associate editor of The Citizen. Previously an award-winning journalist and editor at The Age, The Sunday Age and BRW, she played a leading role in editorial independence, gender equity, public broadcasting and law reform campaigns as a director of the Walkley Foundation, vice-president of journalists’ union MEAA, and at the ABC and Andrew Denton's Go Gentle Australia. She is founder of investigative agency The Tell and media consultancy Women's Agency.
Email: gina.mccoll@unimelb.edu.au
@gcmccoll
Sean Davey
Sean Davey has 23 years of experience in photojournalism and documentary photography. In 2020 Sean was awarded second place in the World Press Photo Award (Contemporary Issues) and was named the Overall Winner of the National Rural Press Club Awards for Excellence in Journalism. In the same year he was shortlisted for the 2020 Australian Photography Awards for photographs made during the Black Summer bushfire season. Sean was awarded Highly Commended in the National Photographic Portrait Prize in 2016.
From 2005-2014 Sean worked extensively in Papua New Guinea, facilitating community collaborative art programs with the University of Papua New Guinea. Sean is a founder and co-director of Pacific Centre for Photographic Arts.
www.kentondavey.com.au
www.pcpa.com.au
Email: sean.davey@unimelb.edu.au
Dr Caroline James-Garrod
Dr Denis Muller
Dr Denis Muller is Honorary Senior Research Fellow and coordinator of Dilemmas in Journalism: Law and Ethics in the Master of Journalism and Master of International Journalism programs. He is a former Assistant Editor (Investigations) of The Sydney Morning Herald and Associate Editor of The Age. He is the author of Journalism and the Future of Democracy, published by Palgrave Macmillan in August 2021.
Email: dmuller@unimelb.edu.au
@DenisJMuller
Ashleigh Wyss
Honorary Research Fellows
Dr Margaret Simons
Margaret Simons is Honorary Principal Fellow and an award-winning freelance journalist, author and journalism academic. She is well known as a writer and thinker on the future of journalism. Margaret was a founding director of the Public Interest Journalism Initiative (2018-2021) and served as the inaugural Chair of Research (2018-2021). From 2012 until 2017 she served as Director of the Centre for Advancing Journalism.
Email: m.simons@unimelb.edu.au
@MargaretSimons