Jacki Short

Registered Counselling Psychologist and Supervisor, Masters in Adult Education, Registered Play Therapist and Play Therapy Supervisor  

Jacki Short is a highly experienced counselling psychologist, play therapist and supervisor with over 25 years’ experience in counselling, supervision, group work and training. 

She has worked in a wide range of clinical settings including schools, hospitals, welfare organisations, drug and alcohol agencies and in private practice with children and young people. These years of clinical experience have built her knowledge of the active elements for support and change and have inspired Jacki’s belief in the power of imagination, positivity, play and possibilities - especially in the face of challenge. She is the current President of the Australian Play Therapists Association.

As the owner and director of Sydney Centre for Creative Change, Jacki is passionate about supporting others to find creative ways to express, explore and resolve difficulties and to grow strengths and capacity.

Kim Billington

Masters in Counselling, Masters in Narrative Therapy and Community Work, Bachelors in Education

Kim is a registered supervisor and counsellor registered as a clinical supervisor with PACFA and ACA. Kim is passionate about training and supervision and is the author of two books for practitioners: A Counsellor’s Companion, for those working with children, and Counselling Conversations for those working with adult clients.

Committed to passing forward her ever-evolving counselling skills and knowledge, Kim aims to support and inspire counselling practitioners to develop their own unique creative skills and explore new ways to connect with their clients to support healing and identity growth.

As a dynamic course facilitator, Kim has been running training programs including, Playful Narrative Therapy since 2013 for Sydney Centre for Creative Change. She has been facilitating groups and workshops for over 25 years.

Kim began her working life as a teacher in state and Steiner schools where she utilised the healing elements of storytelling to assist children in challenging situations. Committed to supporting the growth and development of others, Kim completed further studies including two masters’ degrees in counselling and in narrative therapy.

In addition to her teaching and training, Kim has broad and rich clinical experience that includes; co-facilitating Men’s Behaviour Change Programs, crisis and general telecounselling, child and family counselling, specialist family violence counselling, EAP brief therapy counselling, family bereavement counselling and individual and group clinical supervision.

Clinical methods that inform Kim’s therapeutic counselling and supervision include, Mindfulness, Narrative Therapy, Somatic work, CFT (compassion-focused therapy), ACT, Creative Expressive Arts, Existential Therapy and befriending emotions. Kim likes to use metaphors and storytelling, Tree of Life work and creative timelines to understand the life-long emergence of identity.

Katerina Bolshakova

Katerina has a Master degree in psychology and is a teacher of psychological disciplines and a practicing psychologist in the Ukraine. She is an art therapist, trauma therapist and developer of methods for psychodiagnostic research into the art of painting on stones and the use of these skills in therapeutic activities.

For the past 3 years, Katerina has been focused on the development and implementation of expressive therapy techniques with painted stones in various types of therapy. In her private practice, she uses her hand painted stones in expressive therapy work appreciating that this allows client to interact directly with objects from nature.

Her background as an artist, led Katerina into hand painting beautiful expressions on small pieces of Greek marble. She now has a thriving practice selling these evocative images on stones to an appreciative expressive therapies community internationally.

Natalie Crake

MHealthSci (Psych), MSWQ (Social Work), RPT (Play Therapy)

Natalie is a Registered Social Worker with the Australian Association of Social Workers and Registered Play Therapist with Australasia Pacific Play Therapy Association. She has a Master of Child and Adolescent Health (Psychology) and Master of Social Work.

Natalie has over 12 years experience in counselling, social work, group work programs and supervision in the not-for-profit sector and in the private family law sector. She uses humanistic and systemic modalities when working with children/families. She is passionate about hearing children’s voices and has worked for many years in the family law sector in furthering children’s participation in society.

Natalie collaborates on a podcast for separate parents and anyone working in the post-separation field and can be heard on Apple Podcast “alwayschildfocused”.

Dr Robert Grant

Dr. Robert Jason Grant is a licensed Professional Counselor, National Certified Counselor, Registered Play Therapist Supervisor, and Advanced Certified Autism Specialist. He owns and operates the Robert Jason Grant Ed.D AutPlay Therapy Clinic. Dr. Grant specializes in working with children, adolescents, and families, including working with autistic children, neurodivergent children, and those diagnosed with ADHD and other developmental disorders. He is the creator of AutPlay® Therapy, an integrative family play therapy approach. He is also a Certified Autism Movement Therapy and trained in EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) Therapy, a Post Traumatic Stress Disorder/trauma related therapy for children and adults. 

Dr. Grant is an international speaker and keynote presenter having presented for the American Counseling Association, Association for Play Therapy, American Mental Health Counselors Association, and The World Autism Congress. He is a multi-published author of several articles, book chapters, and books including the following titles:

• AutPlay® Therapy for Children and Adolescents on the Autism Spectrum
• Play-Based Interventions for Autism Spectrum Disorder
• Understanding Sensory Processing Challenges, A Workbook for Children and Teens
• Understanding Autism Spectrum Disorder, A Workbook for Children and Teens
• Understanding ADHD: A Workbook for Children and Teens
• AutPlay® Therapy Play and Social Skills Groups: A Ten Session Model
• Play Therapy Theories and Perspectives: Diversity of Thought in the Field

Dr. Grant is a founding board member for the non-profit organization Stars for Autism. He is currently serving on the board of directors (president elect) for the Association for Play Therapy. He is also a part time instructor in the Play Therapy Certificate program at Mid America Nazarene University (MNU). Dr. Grant is also a Certified Behavioral Life Coach through the PeopleKeys® program and provides life coaching, consultations, and play therapy supervision services. He is also a Board Certified Telepractice Specialist providing therapy and coaching through tele processes. 

Matthew Evans

Psychologist and Spiritual Director MA.Psych.

Matthew has worked as a psychologist in both public and private clinics for more than 20 years.

His particular area of interest is in assisting clients to connect with their spirituality and innate wisdom using mindfulness and similar strategies to address a range of presenting problems.

He knows the importance of health and wholeness for optimising wellbeing and bringing our best to helping others.

 Dr Joanna Jaaniste

Registered Dramatherapist

Joanna has been a qualified dramatherapist for 27 years. She has experience with people with mental health issues, and worked in that area in the Therapy and Recovery Service at Liverpool/Fairfield mental health for 19 years. Her doctorate justifies the dramatherapy approach as improving the quality of life of people with dementia.

Joanna is passionate about the ability of this modality to help people to celebrate, grieve and to work creatively with any present issues around their diagnosis or their lives in the here and now. Surprisingly in her fieldwork with people with dementia for her thesis, there were examples where issues from long ago were also healed.

She follows the developmental model of dramatherapy, where care is taken to recognize the later life stages of most people with dementia. Instead of emphasizing the differences from those elderly people without dementia, she looks for the similarities – for example, forgetting words, being happy to sit quietly, feeling the presence of others (sometimes those who have died), and reflecting on the past. They have much to teach us.

Jamie Lynn Langley

Licensed Clinical Social Worker

Jamie Lynn Langley, MSSW, LCSW, is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker currently in private practice in Smyrna, TN (USA) and is on faculty at Middle TN State University. She has specialized in working with children, teens and families for over 33 years. Jamie co-founded the TN Assoc. for Play Therapy and served as its first president. Jamie has a passion for creativity, play and nature and integrates these personally as well as professionally in her clinical practice including supervision, writing, training, teaching, and encouragingly for self-care. Puppets were some of Jamie’s favorite toys as a child, and she delights in using them in child and play therapy for helping and healing.

Adanna Jean

Registered Psychologist, Masters in Counselling and Masters in Professional Psychology

Adanna is a psychologist and director at Meliora Psychology in Melbourne, having over 10 years’ experience in mental health and community welfare settings in Australia, London, and Dublin. Adanna  works with clients with a range of presentations including depression and anxiety, trauma, forensic interactions, and experience of disability. With a professional interest in supporting members of the LGBTQIA+ community,  and people with neurodifference, Adanna believes in fostering curiosity and compassion towards all aspects of the self and building empowerment for individuals of all ages to identify and draw upon their own strengths and resilience.

As an integrative therapist, Adanna draws on a relational, compassion-based approach incorporating creative arts therapies, which she feels best allows her to meet each individual where they are at. Adanna has been associated with the Sydney Centre for Creative Change since early 2020 where she started in the support team and continues to be inspired by those she meets through its many group, training and supervision offerings.

Professor Sue Jennings PhD 

Anthropologist, therapist, performer, and author.

Professor Jennings is Senior Research Fellow, The Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham Distinguished Scholar, University of the Witwatersrand, Honorary Fellow of the University of Roehampton, and Professor of Play - awarded by the European Federation of Dramatherapy. She has been a pioneer of Dramatherapy and Play Therapy in the UK and overseas.

Professor Jennings' paradigm ‘embodiment-projection-role’ is integrated into education and therapy world-wide. Having worked as a clinician in psychiatry, forensic settings and special education, she has focussed her recent practice and research on early years development and developed ‘Neuro-Dramatic-Play’ as a basis for attachment and empathy.

She emphasises the importance of ‘play from conception’ for healthy emotional and social growth. Her doctoral fieldwork was with a tribal community in the Malaysian rain forest, which she believes underpins all her childhood theory and therapy. Sue is a prolific author with over fifty publications on theory and application to her name. She believes passionately in ‘playing for peace’ with a rule of ‘no guns in the playroom’.

Judy King

Registered Art Therapist

Judy is a registered art psychotherapist and practicing artist. She has also been a registered nurse for over thirty years working with trauma in varying capacities. Nurturing, health and art are her passions; Art therapy has given her the ability to combine these, marrying her nursing and creativity. Her therapeutic work has encompassed early intervention, at-risk adolescents in the school system, children’s palliative care, survivors of domestic violence and adults with mental health issues, chronic pain and palliative care.

Her clinical work forms the basis for three chapters Trans Generational Trauma and the Aboriginal Pre-school child. Healing through Intervention, Tracey, N. (Ed.) (2015) and has also been included in Art therapy in the early years: therapeutic interventions with infants, toddlers and their families, J. Meyerowitz-Katz, & D. Reddick. (2017)

She has worked independently in Uganda, Honduras, Bangladesh and Mexico bridging cultural, legal, secular and religious divides to initiate, execute and complete large public murals painted with children.

Judy works part-time as the Art therapist at Bear Cottage Paediatric Hospice, Sydney with children with life-limiting illnesses and their families. She also runs community-based art therapy workshops for seniors and has her own private practice.

Natalie Mackenzie

Masters in Dramatherapy, Registered Dramatherapist

Natalie has always been fascinated at how role-play, stories and drama have the power to foster creativity, imagination, learning, insight and personal growth. Having obtained her Masters degree in Dramatherapy from Roehampton University in London, UK, she is passionate about empowering children and their families to cope with life's challenges in creative ways.

A registered dramatherapist with ANZATA (Australia and New Zealand Arts Therapy Association) and the British Association of Dramatherapists in the UK, Natalie has over 10 years' experience working with children who have experienced emotional trauma. She has worked in a therapeutic centre for children who have experienced abuse, neglect, grief and loss and is the founder of Playful Minds which provides individual and group dramatherapy programs to support children’s mental health.

Currently, she is working in Early Intervention Psychosis as well as with children whose parents are in alcohol and drug rehabilitation. She also provides individual and group dramatherapy programs to support anxiety, emotional regulation and social skills through her private practice. Her creative approach supports children and young people in dealing with life’s serious stuff.

Bonita Mitting

Art Therapist and Counsellor (AThR)

Bonita is a therapist who whole-heartedly believes in the power of creative arts therapies (art, music, movement and play therapy). In her 9 years of clinical practice, she has witnessed the power of creative arts and play therapies to allow children and young people to meaningfully express the unbearable, work through difficult experiences, and transform these to enhance their sense of self and life.

Bonita has worked in a range of roles and settings, including specialist family violence services, Out of Home Care, and inclusive and trauma-responsive education. Bonita currently works as a children’s counsellor, part of a not-for-profit women’s family violence agency directly delivering services within a trauma-recovery program for children, young people and carers aged 0 - 17 who have experienced different forms control and/ or violence and/ or abuse.

Professor Peter Mortola

Peter Mortola, Ph.D. is a Professor in the Counseling, Therapy and School Psychology Department at Lewis and Clark College's Graduate School of Education and Counseling, Portland, Oregan, USA. He is the author of Windowframes: Learning the art of Gestalt play therapy the Oaklander way (Routledge/Gestaltpress, 2006), the culmination of 10 years of inquiry and research on Violet Oaklander’s methods of both child therapy and adult training. Windowframes has been translated into German, Spanish, Romanian, Italian and Korean. He is also the co-author of BAM! Boys Advocacy and Mentoring: A leader’s guide to facilitating strength-based groups for boys (Routledge, 2008), and The Bear Inside (19th Avenue Press, with Illustrator Mark Molchan), a children's book about regulating strong emotions. The Bear Inside has been translated into Spanish, Bulgarian, Russian, and Sinhala language versions. For 15 years, he has also facilitated a partnership between Lewis & Clark College and David Douglas School District in which graduate students have served over 1500 sixth-grade students in the small group counselling setting.

Dr Jodi Mullen

PhD, LMHC, RPT-S, CCPT-Master

Jodi Ann Mullen has been a Mental Health Counselor and Play Therapist for over 25 years. She is a professor at SUNY Oswego in the Counseling & Psychological Services Department where she coordinates the Graduate Certificate Program in Play Therapy. She is also the Director of Integrative Counseling Services in New York State. Dr. Mullen is an international speaker and author. She has authored several manuscripts on play therapy and counselling. Dr. Mullen navigates the world of child-rearing on her podcast Freakishly Well-Behaved Kids. Most importantly, she is the proud mother of Andrew and Leah.

Susan Perrow

Masters in Education

Susan passionately believes 'stories know the way'! She has an extensive background in lecturing, consulting, writing and storytelling. Susan is based in Australia but travels internationally giving workshops and training seminars for teachers, counsellors and health professionals in the UK, Europe, North America, Asia and China.

In 2000, Susan developed the first course on Storytelling for an Australian University (S.C.U.) and completed her Masters Research on Storytelling. She has received Australian Government funding to pilot creative courses and (storytelling) resources for children with challenging behaviour. Her work at a U.S. National Medical Conference - 'This Examined Life' - at Iowa University in 2013 was accredited by the AMA.

Susan writes, collects and documents stories that offer a therapeutic journey for the storyteller and listener - a positive, imaginative way of helping resolve challenging situations. Her story work has led to the publication by Hawthorne Press, U.K. of three resource books, the first two in ten languages: Healing Stories for Challenging Behaviour (2008), Therapeutic Storytelling - 101 Healing Stories for Children (2012) and, An A-Z Collection of Behaviour Tales for Children (2017). Today her time is spent writing, consulting with teachers, parents and therapists, and running seminars on therapeutic storytelling.  Listen to Susan's interview with Richard Fidler (ABC Radio - Conversations).

Ann Soo Lawrence

Social Worker, Creative Arts Therapist, Artist

Ann Soo Lawrence lives in Melbourne and is in private practice as a social worker and creative arts therapist. She is also a practising artist who finds something new to draw every day for self-care, fun and mindfulness.

After a career in clinical social work for over twenty-five years (specialising in counselling and mental health), Ann wanted to explore new ways for clients to express themselves beyond words. She began to use felting in her therapeutic work with teenagers for self- awareness and self-expression. This interest sparked Ann to join an art therapy group and then further study with IKON in Art Therapy (2017).

Of particular interest to Ann is working in a trauma informed way using creative modalities. These include embodied practices, music, writing, use of story-telling and art making for healing and recovery.

Holding space and working alongside survivors of torture and trauma has been a humbling and important learning experience in the last four years for Ann. It has challenged and stretched her practice and emphasised the importance of client centred work by creating temenos and openness to what emerges and working in innovative and experimental ways. Working on Zoom has also carved out new opportunities and skills.

Ann is an active member of the AASW and HTA.

Vicky Shukuroglou

Vicky is a multidisciplinary artist and writer with a passion for activating dynamic, reflective learning spaces and a powerful sense of identity.

Using creative practice as a vehicle and path to enhance empathy, awareness, connectivity, and innovation, Vicky supports individuals and groups to achieve positive transformation and valuable participation.

As a colleague described, '…perhaps everything Vicky does reflects a cultural narrative about how we learn with and from each other'.

Vicky works with people of diverse ages and far-ranging cultural backgrounds. National and international residencies, exhibitions and workshops contribute to the depth of understanding and development of learning concepts which Vicky explores, expands, and is sought out to share.

Her creative pedagogy is known for stimulating participants’ sense of possibility, capacity, and motivation to learn and engage with their world in meaningful ways.

Vicky's workshops have been supported by various organisations including UNESCO, Sanskriti Kendra, Instituto Sacatar, World Crafts Council, Salaam Baalak, VEOHRC, City of Melbourne, Arts Victoria, Fed Square, and schools in regional and metropolitan Australia.

Beate Steller

Masters of Ageing and Pastoral Studies, Masters in Adult Education, Bachelors in Social Worker

Accredited Mental Health Social Worker and Counsellor, M.A.P.S., M.Ed. (Adult Ed), BSW (Hon)

Beate has always loved art, even as a small child, and nearly pursued a career in art when instead, she decided to do nursing and then social work. She kept dabbling in it until a decade ago when her mother died. She found herself naturally drawn back to art as a way to heal her loss and to come to terms with so many changes in her life. Now she uses art in her counselling work and with older people in aged care and palliative care.

Beate brings over 30 years of experience in a variety of industries to her role as a principal Training and Development Consultant. Beate also currently works as a Spiritual Care Team Leader in aged and palliative care. She has been an adult educator since 1992, for organizations including the Centre for Community Welfare Training, the Australian College of Applied Psychology, the Professional Development People and Lifeline Sydney. In the last ten years, Beate has specialised in grief and loss education/counselling, transition counselling and applied mindfulness. She started her own inner work over three decades ago with Yoga and Vipassana and walked the Camino in Spain in 2015. She has been a board member of NALAG (National Association for Loss and Grief) since 2009.

Beate has both graduate and post-graduate qualifications in Adult Education, Social Work and Nursing, holds a Certificate IV in Assessment and Workplace Training and is currently completing her second Master Degree in Ageing and Pastoral studies at Charles Sturt University. She continues to work with people from Indigenous and culturally diverse backgrounds. Beate also holds professional membership with the Australian Association of Social Workers, the N. S. W. Health Services Profession (as a Registered Nurse), and Spiritual Care Australia.

Cathy Williams

Cathy Williams is a Movement and Expressive Arts Therapy Facilitator. 

She has worked in the field of Community Development within Australia and internationally for 14 years, designing and implementing a number of grassroots community, youth and social justice programs focused on capacity building. 

Her ‘Intuitive Self’ offerings, since 2016, utilise movement and creative modalities as avenues to enhance participants connection to their innate Body Wisdom and strengthen their ability to listen to, trust in and follow their intuitive guidance. 

Encouraging client's agency and creative self-discovery, Cathy guides individuals and community groups through experiences to inspire curious inquiry and access inner resources which support them to navigate the ebb and flow of this wild life.