Who Are We
Community Praxis Co-op draws on its members and networks of colleagues to put together multi-disciplinary teams of experienced practitioners appropriate for particular projects.
The Directors of Community Praxis Co-op are have significant experience in various fields.
Dave Andrews
Dave Andrews, his wife Ange, and their adult children, share a joint household. They have lived in intentional community, and worked in community development with disadvantaged groups in Asia and Australia for the last thirty years.
In India, Dave helped start a therapeutic community called 'Dilaram', a community rehabilitation centre called 'Sahara', and a community reconstruction service called 'Sharan'. Upon his return to Australia, he helped start a community network called the 'Waiters Union', in which he still plays an active part.
Dave works as a community worker in West End, his own local area; and, at the same time, works for Tear Australia, an inter-national aid and development agency.
Dave teaches courses on community development and consults with community groups and organisations all over the world. He is the author of numerous articles and books, including Building A Better World.
Neil Barringham
Neil Barringham enjoys juggling a range of roles and commitments. His work with young people and in mental health over the past twenty years has usually found him focussing on building networks of contact and communication and mobilising and supporting people in taking a more hands-on role with others.
Neil encourages friends and colleagues to greater understanding of and congruence in the connections between their inner and outer worlds. He has a particular interest in facilitating spaces of safety and welcome and openness between people.
Neil is currently the Coordinator of 'A Place to Belong', a small agency which focuses on assisting people with mental health challenges to participate more fully in community life.
Howard Buckley
Howard is currently Manager of Deception Bay Community Youth Programs in a part time capacity. His work experiences include six years as a Social Planner with the Caboolture Shire Council and twenty years of work in the community sector with mainly neighbourhood centres & youth services. Born in Qld he spent his childhood moving around Australia as part of an Air force family. For the last 18 years he has lived in Maleny with his partner and children.
Howard loves spending time with his family (including his crazy dogs), bushwalking, camping and reminding people that AFL is the real football. He is a passionate supporter of the Richmond Football Club and is actively involved in the Maleny Neighbourhood Centre. He enjoys the humour of Leunig & The Far Side and is a Monty Python tragic. He has a particular interest in exploring ways to degunkify his world (see Michael Leunig’s cartoon in ‘Goatperson’ for more details).
Gerard Dowling
Gerard was born in North Queensland, a descendent of Irish-English folk who came looking for gold in the 1870's and ended up scratching for tin and wrangling packhorses in the bush. Since 1987 he has lived in the inner Brisbane suburb of West End, where he has shared a home with Lyn, raised Ciaron and Jack, and (much to his surprise) fulfilled Ciaron’s naïve childhood dream of growing a rainforest in the backyard of a humble rented cottage on a little sixteen perch block.
He's done 20 years in various community development roles, including housing work with the Tenants’ Union, prisons work with the Catholics, and collaborative community planning consultancies with Community Praxis Co-op. He currently organises youth projects for Brisbane City Council, exploring creative ways to engage young people in youth space, urban design, multicultural community, sustainability, active travel, social enterprise, and e-citizenship - with a great crew of young and young-at-heart colleagues in an innovative local government context.
Tina Lathouras
Tina lives in the Sunshine Coast Hinterland at Maleny. For the past 7 years, she has had the privilege of building community from her base at the Nambour Community Centre, where she was the Coordinator / Community Development Worker. Her passion for developmental community work is fueled by being part of processes where people’s hopes and dreams are realized through creative collective action. However, Tina acknowledges that this work can be tough, especially in the funded social services sector - a context where it seems to be getting harder to work developmentally. She is currently reflecting on this and other ideas by undertaking doctoral studies at UQ.
Ken Morris
Ken Morris was born in country Queensland but has lived in Brisbane since arriving there aged eighteen to study at university. Ken is Director of Jabiru Community Youth and Children’s Services. He has thirty-five years of experience in youth work, child care, community development and organisational development and management in faith-based, local and interest-based communities in Brisbane.
His experience includes a period as part-time Lecturer in postgraduate community development at the University of Queensland. Ken proudly identifies as a gay man in community work, and has also developed a special interest in holistic forms of management in ‘community’ organisations.
Lynda Shevellar
Lynda Shevellar is an experienced facilitator, with a background in psychology and education and an emphasis upon participative approaches to learning. She has studied and worked in community development, as well as having spent time in the Australian Public Service. She has a particular interest in the fields of disability and mental health, and more recently in community economic development, where her focus has been on assisting people to obtain a rich and meaningful life within community.
Peter Westoby
Peter originally hails from the UK but now loves living in Highgate Hill, Brisbane. He is currently a Lecturer in Community Development within the School of Social Work & Human Services and a Research Associate with the Australian Centre for Peace & Conflict Studies ACPACS) . His recently completed PhD explores a model of social healing with/in resettling refugee work. Previously his experience has included work in youth, community and organisational development in South Africa, PNG, the Philippines and Australia.
His interests are in refugee related work, youth work practice and community development. He is passionate about running, reading, good coffee, hanging out at Avid reader book shop, bush walking and traveling. His current greatest dilemma is how to align his love of travel with carbon emissions.
Polly Walker
Polly is of Cherokee and Settler descent and grew up in New Mexico on the traditional land of the Mescalero Apache. Her experiences there led to a passion for and commitment to cross cultural community work. She has lived and worked in Australia for 13 years. Her work focuses on the interface between Indigenous and Settler cultures.
She is currently a postdoctoral Fellow with the Australian Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Queensland, and works with a number of community groups within Australia and The United States, exploring culturally appropriate and sustainable ways of transforming conflict.
Polly is devoted to the support of Indigenous people and their ways of knowing of being in a changing world. She is also a passionate supporter of the reintroduction of the Mexican Grey Wolf (Lobo) to their traditional homelands where she grew up.
