About the director

Donna Zander is the Director of Donna Zander & Assoc. Donna is an accredited mental health social worker with the Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW). ). She has significant experience in trauma, child abuse and family violence and working therapeutically with children, women and families. She has worked in this field for over 30 years both as a professional and a volunteer (having been a foster carer and a local government politician).

She is an accomplished practitioner-trainer advocate.

Donna graduated with a Bachelor of Behavioural Science majoring in Psychology (1986) and in Social Work (1988) from La Trobe University. In 2009 Donna upgraded her training certificate to possess the T.A.A. and has trained others in Certificate and Diploma level courses in disability and community services. In 2011 Donna completed her Diploma in Management.

Her experience in the sector is extensive, she has been: a community development/caseworker at a Migrant Resource Centre in Melbourne's west; a Lifeline and Aids line telephone Counsellor; a Counsellor Advocate at a Centre Against Sexual Assault; a young women's group facilitator with a statewide domestic violence service; a Manager of the Social Work Department of Plenty Hospital, a specialized geriatric psychiatry facility; Statewide Co-ordinator of V-Net (now known as No to Violence); a Local Area and Health Rights Co-ordinator at the Victorian Youth Advocacy Network; a Manager of Out of Home Care at Orana Family Services; a Families First clinician at Abercare Family Services; a Team Leader at Reach Out For Kids Foundation and; a Senior Training Consultant with the Australian Childhood Foundation and Domestic Violence Resource Centre Victoria.

She has acted as consultant to a number of State and Federal Government Departments and has demonstrated experience in developing and implementing child focused therapeutic programs and family violence prevention campaigns.

Donna is a member of the Australasian Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, the Australasian Pacific Play Therapy Association and the Australian Child & Adolescent Trauma, Loss and Grief Network.

Donna has presented at national and international conferences in Canada, Isreal, Fiji and Bougainville on young people's health, family violence, child abuse and homicide. Her reports documenting action research and innovative young people's advocacy and health projects in the 90's are still in use at Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) today as is an organisation Western Young People's Independent Network Inc. that she was the catalyst for developing.