Debbie Ollis

Dr Debbie Ollis is a senior Lecturer in Education at Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia. She has worked in the gender and education field for over 30 years as a secondary school teacher, policy officer, curriculum consultant, curriculum writing, teacher educator and researcher. Her teaching and research interest intersect in the area of sexuality education, gender, respectful relationships education (gender-based violence education), and health and student wellbeing. Debbie has a long history in the translation of her own and others research into practice through policy, teacher professional learning, teacher education and school-based curriculum in health and sexuality education. She has been principal author of two Australian sexuality education frameworks (Talking Sexual Health, 1999 and Gender and Violence Position Paper, 1993), and a number of sexuality education resources (Talking Sexual Health (2001); Catching On (2004); Sexuality Education Matters (2013); Building Respectful Relationships Stepping out Against Gender Based Violence (2014)) and worked in policy and program development in gender and sexuality education in the state, national and international arena for the past 25 years. She is an active researcher in the sexuality education field, currently working independently and collaboratively on capacity building in sexuality education; respectful relationships; pre-service teacher sexuality education, and an ARC Linkage project with Colleagues from UniSA and ShineSA, researching young peoples experience of and voice in sexuality education http://www.youthsexuality.com.au.