Community & Volunteering

Media and communications, youth work, and events: nationally and regionally. Part of the National Leadership Team within a structured NFP hierarchy, working alongside team leaders across Australia on strategy, programs, and community building. Joined voluntarily as a participant and grew into a leadership contract role in 2023.

Grew the JY Australia Instagram from zero to 2,800+ followers. The key shift was data-driven: noticed static posts were losing 20 to 30% reach every few weeks, while reels consistently reached 2 to 3 times more people. Moved the content strategy toward short-form video and reach improved 30 to 50%.

Looked at audience activity data and adjusted the posting schedule to match when the audience was actually online. Early engagement (likes, comments, shares in the first few hours) lifted 15 to 25%, which compounded into better overall reach per post.

Led a campaign that sourced personal stories from across the JY community, shaped them into written and visual content, and distributed them across social channels. The authenticity was the whole point: an NFP's community voice lands differently than produced content does. People shared because they recognised themselves in it.

Developed promotional materials, advertising, and social communications for youth programs and national events, including Yes Lord (800+ attendees). Coordinated and delivered youth camps, group sessions, and community events across Perth. Managed JY Australia's Squarespace website end-to-end: updates, new pages, event listings, and content changes.

I came into this role as Department Secretary for the Catechism department, but what it turned into was something closer to a full communications function for the parish. The priest had been writing and sending everything himself — emails, updates, announcements — on top of everything else he was managing. It wasn't sustainable, and the communications weren't reaching people the way they needed to.

The arrangement became: the priest gives me the content, dot points, key messages, what needs to go out that week, and I take it from there. I write it up, format it, and get it out to the community.

The original channel was email, and the reach was poor. A lot of families simply weren't seeing the updates. Email open rates in a community like this are unpredictable, and the format wasn't suited to how people in the parish actually communicated day-to-day.

I flagged the reach problem to the parish council and suggested transitioning to WhatsApp. The community was already on it: free, immediate, and far more likely to actually be read. The council agreed, and we made the switch.

We now run three to four WhatsApp groups at maximum capacity — around 1,000 members each — reaching approximately 4,000 people across multiple parish centres under the one church. Over the past year and a half I have sent well over 75 publications, often more than one per week. When the parish has a major event or a topic that needs its own space, I send a separate document rather than cramming everything into one.

The format is clean and easy to read, designed to look good on a phone screen. The priest provides the dot points. I expand on them, write it up properly, and format it so it's presentable. The goal is that someone can open it, read it in two minutes, and know exactly what's happening that week.

The feedback has been genuinely encouraging. A couple of parishioners have mentioned unprompted that they look forward to the weekly update: that it's easy to read, looks good, and actually keeps them properly informed. That kind of response, unprompted, tells you something is working.

Awards Ceremony (1,500 attendees). The parish runs an annual awards ceremony for catechism students across multiple centres. I designed the collateral for the judges and the prize presentation, and sourced the medals and trophies presented on the day. These are kids receiving recognition in front of their families. The details matter.

Career Expo (500+ attendees). Organises and delivers the annual career expo, connecting students with representatives from UWA, Curtin, ECU, and Notre Dame. Working across university representatives, parish volunteers, and the broader community simultaneously makes it more complex than it sounds on paper. Manages all promotion, university liaison, venue logistics, and attendee communications from planning through to execution.

This is the project that most directly mirrors government and community communications work. Writing clearly for a large, diverse audience that didn't ask to be communicated to, and doing it consistently, every week, for a year and a half, is exactly the discipline that roles in public sector communications require.

The WhatsApp transition also demonstrates the ability to identify a channel problem, propose a practical solution, and implement it with results that are immediate and measurable. The career expo is the work I find most personally meaningful: connecting young people with actual information from actual universities changes what feels possible.