Meet the Compass team

The University of Sydney's Compass - find your way to higher education ('Compass') program is a partnership between the University, the NSW Department of Education and Training and selected secondary and primary schools in Sydney.

The University's Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education) has overall oversight of the program, supported by an advisory committee of key stakeholders.

Compass is managed on a day-to-day basis by the University's Social Inclusion Unit which initiates and coordinates project activities, manages resources and reporting.

Compass staff

Director, Social Inclusion
Annette Cairnduff
Annette has been working on equity related issues at the University since 2006. Formerly a primary school teacher, she has more than 20 years experience in capacity building and community development programs in the government and non-government sectors. She is particularly interested how engagement during the primary school years can impact the expectations of children for higher education access and participation, as well as the expectations of their parents and teachers.

Team Leader – Schools & Communities
Miriam Pellicano
Miriam’s extensive community development experience provided the Compass program with a solid foundation on which to build it’s embedded educational and volunteering programs within Compass partner schools. Her background in development and passion for working with young people has resulted in Miriam undertaking assignments to work on programs in refugee camps in the middle east. Having established our volunteer program, Miriam looks forward to extending the the Compass program further and developing even greater community engagement.

Events Coordinator
Susan Parker
Susan comes to the Social Inclusion Unit with a strong history of project management in the arts and cultural sector and has enjoyed working on a wide variety of local and international events with multicultural and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. She is particularly interested in the power of the arts to bridge social and cultural divides and is also a firm believer in equity of access to education and for this reason, is very happy to be working with the Social Inclusion Unit.

Susan worked as the Senior Program Manager of the Community Languages Schools Program at the Department of Education and Communities before commencing her role at the University of Sydney. She is currently responsible for the management of a range of events for the Compass Program and the Unit more generally.

Administration Assistant
Abigail Clarkson
Abigail has a background working with children and has a passion for encouraging and supporting young people with their life choices and this is what drew her to the Compass program. Abigail’s administration team provides assistance to all members of the Social Inclusion Unit. Part of her role is to collaborate with other team members to publish the Parent Newsletter and to assist with the organisation of several large-scale on-campus ‘experience’ days every year. Abigail looks forward to the new and exciting challenges this role continues to deliver.

Project Officer - Volunteers Coordinator
Mike Tran
Mike joins the Social Inclusion Unit in 2011 and brings with him a wealth of experience in supporting university student volunteer programs. In his role with Compass, Mike will be responsible for the marketing, recruitment, training and support of Compass program volunteers. Mike looks forward to developing, even further, the role of Compass volunteers in supporting the attainment of students in primary and high school.

Project Officer - Schools and Volunteers
Sylvia Utami
Sylvia’s passion for social change and development has brought her to the social inclusion unit in 2011. She is particularly interested in initiatives that foster and support young people’s aspirations. Sylvia brings with her a range of experiences from community and higher education sectors. She looks forward to assisting Compass in implementing projects with primary and secondary schools.

Project Officer - Schools and Communications
Victoria Loy
Before joining the University in Sydney in 2010, Victoria taught high school English in Ontario, and then undergraduate writing in British Columbia, Canada. Since 2010, Victoria has worked with the Faculty of Art and Social Sciences’ Writing Hub, assisting in the development of a training course for first-year mentors in the Hub’s Student Writing Fellowship program.

As a graduate of the University of Toronto’s teacher education faculty, she has a strong interest in social justice and alternative pathways to higher education, and is thrilled to have found a program that serves such a diversity of students.

Senior Project Officer - Schools
Sophie Partridge
Sophie joins the Social Inclusion Unit with a broad range of experience from working in Widening Participation roles at three universities in the UK. From her first involvement with social inclusion initiatives as a Student Ambassador, to managing outreach programs across London, Sophie has a passion for working with young people.

Sophie’s most recent work building new partnerships and developing new programs with London schools means that she looks forward to continuing to build and develop relationships with the Compass partner schools.

Administration Assistant
Wicky West
Wicky is the first point of contact for the Social Inclusion Unit and projects a friendly face both in person and over the phone. She provides administrative support to the whole Unit and her duties include general clerical, receptionist, project based work and supporting event organisation.

Prior to joining the Social Inclusion Unit, Wicky has worked in a range of administrative roles within the University of Sydney during which she completed her Masters degree at the University of Sydney Business School. She understands the importance of Higher Education and looks forward to the challenges the role brings.

Post Doctoral Fellow - Educational
Hannah Forsyth

Hannah Forsyth is a historian who completed her PhD in the History Department at the University of Sydney in 2012 on "The Ownership of Knowledge in Higher Education in Australia, 1939-1996".

With a background in higher education, Hannah has published in university learning and teaching as well as in Australian educational and urban history. Hannah has also worked with the Sydney history department developing its social inclusion program, which involved developing partnerships and projects with history teachers in disadvantaged schools in Sydney and in regional Australia, also conducting research on ways to make history more inclusive, in the classroom and beyond.

Hannah's postdoctoral fellowship explores the history of professional knowledge in Australia, considering the ways that regulating knowledge, particularly through education, has created pathways or erected barriers to professional work for diverse groups of Australians. In 2013, this project begins with a case study of work and knowledge in the Broken Hill region, identifying issues with work and education for local young people. She also looks forward to working with staff to help develop a scholarship of social inclusion in higher education.