Meet the current and previous members of our Young Women’s Council who have worked with us to make positive change in the lives of women and gender diverse people experiencing housing instability and homelessness.
If you are interested in connecting with the Young Women’s Council for consultative or advocacy purposes, or a current or former Council member for an advocacy opportunity, please contact YWCA Australia’s Advocacy and External Affairs Team at advocacy@ywca.org.au
Click the years served to jump to that period’s cohort.
Annette is a qualified lawyer and a proud African-Australian woman, passionate about gender equality and culturally responsive leadership. Professionally, she serves as an Assistant Director at the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC). In this role, she works to uphold transparency and accountability in government decision-making, strengthening her skills in policy interpretation, public engagement, and leadership.
Beyond her work in the public sector, Annette is the Founder and President of Amplify Black Women (ABW), a grassroots organisation dedicated to empowering Black women in Sydney. Through ABW, she creates safe, empowering spaces for women to thrive, with events focused on mental health, financial literacy, and professional development.
Annette’s leadership is deeply shaped by her lived experience as an African-Australian woman, community engagement, and a strong belief in equity and representation.
Ashley grew up in Fremantle, WA, and has long been passionate about improving mental health outcomes in regional communities. After completing her psychology degree, she relocated to Albany, where she now works as a private-sector psychologist while raising her one-year-old son.
Ashley is an active board member of the Albany Community Foundation, where she leads youth engagement and fundraising efforts. Through initiatives like the annual BIG Sleep Out, the Foundation has raised over $250,000 to reduce the impact of homelessness in the Great Southern region. Her professional background spans the NDIS, youth services, and reintegration support for people exiting the justice system.
Driven by a commitment to grassroots leadership and systemic change, Ashley joined the Young Women’s Council to both contribute her lived and professional experience and gain new skills to strengthen her impact within her local and wider communities.
Claudia Robinson is a passionate solicitor and human rights advocate dedicated to advancing equity, justice, and social inclusion. Admitted to practice law in both Australia and New Zealand, Claudia’s work is focused on supporting marginalised communities and fostering systemic change. Beyond her legal expertise, Claudia is deeply engaged in community service, mentoring emerging professionals, and creating accessible resources to empower others. She brings a trauma-informed and culturally sensitive approach to her work, ensuring that every voice is heard and valued.
Claudia undertakes a range of volunteer activities in the not-for-profit sector. Currently, Claudia serves as the Chair of the NSW Young Lawyers Human Rights Subcommittee and the Deputy Chair for Australian Lawyers for Human Rights’ Human Rights Act(s) Committee, in addition to being part of the executive management team. Claudia’s work has garnered international recognition, including receiving the Education Leadership Award from the Legacy Project.
Claudia is the Young Woman YWCA Director appointed by the Board to the Young Women’s Council.
For the past ten years, Gabrielle has sought opportunities to engage in her community, gravitating towards causes that support disadvantaged young people, particularly young women. Specifically with YWCA, Gabrielle first encountered the organisation during the inaugural year of The Girls Leadership Network program, funded by a Great yDeas grant in 2017. After two years as a participant, Gabrielle established a Sydney chapter and facilitated the program for two additional cohorts.
Gabrielle currently engages with YWCA and young women in her community as a youth mentor with the Youth Frontiers program. Professionally, Gabrielle works as an Executive Assistant and is an MBA candidate at the Australian Graduate School of Management. Gabrielle holds an undergraduate degree in Anthropology and Linguistics, which, along with lived experience of intimate partner violence and housing instability, informs much of her professional and volunteer work.
Kaygan is a queer, disabled artist, creative, and advocate based on Whadjuk Noongar Boodjar. Kaygan works as an Equity Projects Coordinator (Disability) at Edith Cowan University, where they lead institution-wide inclusion initiatives and community-driven programs for staff and students with disability.
Kaygan is a co-chair and co-founder of the Pride with Disability Network, a peer-led network for LGBTIQA+ people with disability, and represents LGBTIQA+ people with disability on WA’s First LGBTIQA+ Inclusion Strategy Reference Group.
Kaygan’s advocacy experience includes roles with the Youth Disability Advocacy Network, Youth Affairs Council and WA, and Children and Young People with Disability Australia. Kaygan brings skills in strategy, creative communication, and systems change – grounded in community care and interdependence. They are passionate about ensuring any advocacy around key societal priorities reflect disabled ways of existing.
Lena is an Afghan-Australian youth advocate, university student, and community leader passionate about gender equity, climate justice, and multicultural representation. She is currently studying International Relations and finance at the University of Melbourne and has served on various youth advisory councils including Plan International Australia, Department of Climate Change Energy, Environment and Water, and the Multicultural Youth Advocacy Network.
Lena is the founder of Strive Connecting, an initiative empowering young people from refugee and migrant backgrounds through storytelling and workshops. She has represented youth voices at national and international conferences and worked actively to drive intersectional policy reform. She has previously hosted a community radio program, speaks at public forums, and leads grassroots projects across Australia.
Lena is deeply committed to ensuring diverse voices are not only heard, but genuinely included in decision-making spaces.
Pranjali is a 26-year-old South Asian Australian living in Naarm/Melbourne. She is a journalist at SBS News, a Juris Doctor student, and the Head of Media at Raise Our Voice Australia. Pranjali has worked across media, government and advocacy to champion gender equality, housing, prevention of family violence, child protection and youth justice. Pranjali is also a Plan Australia YAS alum and past Youth Congress member advising the Victorian Government.
As a young victim-survivor, Pranjali knows how critical safe, empowering spaces are—and she wants to build them. Pranjali uses storytelling and policy reform to centre the voices of young women, especially from multicultural and marginalised communities.
Change doesn’t come from taking up less space—it comes from using your voice for what matters. That’s what motivated Pranjali to apply for the YWCA Young Women’s Council – to help build a safer, more equal world – together with incredible, driven people.
Rhiannon is a proud disabled, queer woman who believes in safety, community, and empowerment. She believes that, “If you hold privilege, like I do as a white cis woman, you have a responsibility and duty to use it to challenge systems that benefit you and actively be a part of the reform while prioritising intersectionalism and authentic representation, co-design and lived in experience.”
Rhiannon has spent years advocating, campaigning, and organising against inequality through grassroots action, research, volunteering, and movement building. Her work is driven by lived experience, deep empathy, and a fire for justice that doesn’t burn out. Rhiannon has stood on stages, in rallies, in boardrooms and in Parliament House, always fighting for real reform led by those most impacted.
Rhiannon’s expertise lies at the intersection of disability and gender issues. She is also a second-hand fashion lover and upcycler, local music and drag scenes punter. The relationship between politics and the arts, specifically music, is what initially engaged Rhiannon’s politics passion and she loves incorporating the relationship between the two into her work. Rhiannon describes herself as loud, colourful, authentic, and always brings those qualities to her activism too.
Tamika is a Widjabul Wia-Bal Bundjalung woman connected to the Aboriginal communities in Redfern, the Central Coast, and Northern Rivers regions. Tamika became a mother at a young age (20) and a mother of three before 30.
She is passionate about advocating the complex barriers young parents experience which systematically prevent their equal access to opportunities. Tamika often draws from her own lived experience and is dedicated to ensuring that young parents have equitable access to services, opportunity, and participation within the workforce- particularly STEM.
Tamika is postgraduate qualified and spent a decade within the Australian construction industry. During this time, she witnessed many injustices of this sector, and how this impacts housing insecurity, mental health, and First Nations workforce development and participation. This recently led Tamika to undertake an Atlantic Fellowship with the University of Melbourne (2024); focused on applying self-determination principles to address Aboriginal housing needs.
Angelina is a passionate youth and health equity activist committed to amplifying diverse, intersectional voices for a more equitable world. She is completing her Bachelor of Health Sciences in 2024 and will begin her Doctor of Medicine and Surgery at ANU in 2025. Angelina draws on her expertise in research, advocacy, and campaigning, as well as her lived experience as a queer woman of colour from a low socioeconomic background, to drive systemic change.
Elected as Queensland’s Youth Health Minister in 2021, Angelina led a groundbreaking Youth Bill to end period poverty. Since then, she has collaborated with youth activists in Nepal and Indonesia to research the gendered impacts of climate change, serves on the International Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights Consortium, and is the Lead Campaigner for Sexual Health Advocates for Reproductive Equity (SHARE), advancing universal access to contraception in Australia. She also serves as a board director at Sexual Health and Family Planning ACT and the Australian Women’s Health Alliance, where her intersectional feminist perspective supports gender equity in healthcare and sexual and reproductive health justice.
Asha Clementi is the Founder and CEO of Girls Run the World. She is an award-winning gender equality activist creating opportunities for young women in leadership and diplomacy. She graduated from the Australian National University with a Master of Diplomacy in 2022 and a Bachelor of International Security Studies in 2021.
At the age of 17, she co-founded The Girls Leadership Network. The program holds a series of free leadership workshops for young women aged 16 to 21, inspiring participants to create and run their own initiatives – from school clubs to social impact startups. In 2018, Asha founded Girls Run The World – a program that encourages young women to consider careers in diplomacy. It has given over 300 participants the opportunity to spend a day in 50 participating Embassies and High Commissions, meeting with ambassadors and making tangible contributions to the embassy’s work. In 2024, in collaboration with the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at ANU, she started the Women in Strategic Policy program – a new initiative, funded by the Department of Defence that trains and supports young women to contribute to Australia’s strategic policy debate.
She was named the 2022 ACT Young Woman of the Year and one of the 40 Under 40 Most Influential Asian-Australians. Her work has been recognised internationally, as she received a Commonwealth Points of Light award from Queen Elizabeth II and a Hän Honour from the Government of Finland.
Claudia undertakes a range of volunteer activities in the not for profit sector. Currently, Claudia serves as the Chair of the NSW Young Lawyers Human Rights Subcommittee and the Deputy Chair for Australian Lawyers for Human Rights’ Human Rights Act(s) Committee, in addition to being part of the executive management team.
Claudia’s work has garnered international recognition, including receiving the Education Leadership Award from the Legacy Project.
Lauren is a proud Arabana and Southern Arrernte person raised on Boon-wurrung country, and a passionate advocate for marginalised people, having held advisory and policy guidance roles in several organisations. They were on the Youth Advisory Committee for the Royal Children’s Hospital from 2013-2018 as a person with disability. Lauren has also been heavily involved in student representation at the University of Melbourne Student Union, serving as both an Indigenous Committee member and general council representative in 2021, and a student-elected Office Bearer in 2022.
They describe themselves as an intersectional feminist and aim to platform the concerns and struggles of women and gender diverse people oppressed on several axes – women and gender diverse people who are Indigenous, people of colour, living with disability, queer, migrant and refugee. They believe that this is integral to ensuring the liberation and equality of all women and gender diverse people.
Rhiannon is a disabled, queer 25-year-old woman whose life is dedicated to social justice. She has spent over a decade volunteering in diverse roles with social justice organisations, bringing particular passion to policy and education reform. With experience spanning the NGO, private, public, grassroots, pharmacy, and government sectors, Rhiannon now focuses on gender-based violence, disability rights, and accessibility.
In recent years, she has merged her personal health journey and self-advocacy in the medical and healthcare industries with her activism and training, raising awareness of how to navigate health services and self-advocacy, with a gendered perspective and integrating accessibility and inclusion. Her passion and overall aim is to engage and encourage everyone to participate in community issues and socio-political matters.
Rhiannon is especially passionate about amplifying the intersectional voices of young women and gender-diverse individuals, which are often overlooked in housing policy and the disability rights landscape. Her advocacy centres on the human experience, and she champions learning through the lived experiences of others.
Sarah is the founder of What Were You Wearing (WWYW), a non-profit organisation focusing on providing education, awareness and advocacy on sexual violence. She is a survivor advocate of both child sexual abuse and adult sexual assault.
She is passionate about ending domestic and sexual violence and being able to help and support survivors. In 2023, she was awarded Newcastle Woman of the Year and was also awarded New South Wales Volunteer of the Year by Youth Action in 2022.
Her main passions are bringing awareness to how First Nations people, people living with a disability, and people within the LGBTQIA+ community are more affected by sexual violence. Being a part of all three communities has allowed her to have unique lived experience within these groups. Sarah is also studying a dual Bachelor of Law and Communication at the University of Newcastle.
Tamika is a Widjabul Wia-Bal Bundjalung woman connected to the Aboriginal communities in Redfern, the Central Coast, and the Northern Rivers region. Tamika became a mother at a young age (20) and often draws from this lived experience when advocating for other young women and highlighting the complex barriers faced by young parents and First Nations peoples.
Tamika is postgraduate qualified and spent a decade working, studying and travelling within the Australian construction industry, where she worked in tier 1 construction management. Within this time, she witnessed many injustices of the building and development sector, and how this significantly impacts housing insecurity, mental health, and First Nations workforce development and participation.
Tamika is a 2024 Atlantic Fellow for the University of Melbourne, where she is completing a Master of Social Change Leadership and undertaking a social change project developing housing for Aboriginal communities.
Zoe Keath is a policy officer, youth advocate, and the founder of #SubmissionsSunday, an initiative dedicated to amplifying youth participation in parliamentary and government decision-making processes. Driven by a commitment to elevating youth voices across all levels of policy, Zoe collaborates with various organisations to advance this mission. Zoe is also an honours graduate from QUT, specialising in criminology and psychology, with her honours thesis examining the role of politics and social media in far-right extremism. Her contributions to the community have earned her recognition as one of the top 20 Women in Sustainable Development, a Young Woman to Watch in International Affairs (2023), and a Semi-Finalist in the 7News Young Achievers and Community Achievement Awards (2024).
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