An innovative collaboration driving high quality research to improve children’s lives

Working together to improve the development, education, health and wellbeing of young Australians, the University of South Australian and the department have joined forces in a unique approach to research translation.

The Fraser Mustard Centre has been created to bring together leading Australian child development researchers and innovative government policy makers and planners.

The Fraser Mustard Centre collaboration aims to:

• improve and promote the health and wellbeing of all children and young people in South Australia through the unique application of multidisciplinary research
• help shift focus from the historical delineation between health and education services to an integrated approach with a focus on child development
• build capacity amongst public sector staff and academic researchers to design, undertake and use research to improve the environments in which children live and the service systems which support families
• attract funding for shared priorities for research that leads to improved developmental, education, health and wellbeing outcomes for children.

About Dr Fraser Mustard

The Centre is named in honour of leading Canadian researcher and former Adelaide Thinker-in-Residence, Dr Fraser Mustard. Dr Mustard was a world leader in early childhood development and the social and economic influences on human development and health. His career spanned health sciences, research and the public sector. He was also the man behind Canada's Institute for Advanced Research, as well as a Canadian Medical Hall of Fame inductee.

In 2006, Dr Mustard brought his expertise on child development to South Australia and his work inspired pioneering government strategies and policy direction. The resulting partnerships promoted innovation in parenting programs, built strategic legacies and enhanced the state’s reputation as a committed leader in child development.

Fraser Mustard Centre executive project group

Professor Sally Brinkman, Professor, UniSA Education Futures and David Engelhardt, Director, Measurement Strategy and Research Department for Education are the Co-Directors of the Fraser Mustard Centre.

The Fraser Mustard Centre executive project group is led by Martin Westwell, Chief Executive of the Department for Education, and Shane Dawson, Executive Dean Education Futures and Professor of Learning Analytics at the University of South Australia.

For further information email EDC-research@unisa.edu.au.

Fraser Mustard Centre team members

David Engelhardt, PSM, Director Measurement Strategy and Research, Department for Education, Co-Director, Fraser Mustard Centre

Mr David Engelhardt is the Director, Measurement Strategy and Research at the Department for Education in South Australia. Mr Engelhardt is also one of the founding Co-Directors of the Fraser Mustard Centre.

Mr Engelhardt is responsible for the design and delivery of a suite of projects that are connected to the Purpose of Public Education. The Unit will develop a suite of projects directly aligned to progressing “The Purpose of Public Education” reforms. The aim of these projects will be to build organisational capacity across the Department to deliver new capabilities to align with a more holistic policy agenda.

He is also involved in dealing with a number of research projects which aim to use linked data to better understand population level drivers of educational and developmental outcomes.

The development of a process to measure and report on the wellbeing of children at the population level has resulted in contracts with other state governments and the government of Dubai to provide these services on a commercial basis. Prior to joining the Department in July 2008, Mr Engelhardt has worked in health and community services sectors at an executive level.

Sally Brinkman, BA, MPH, PhD, Co-Director, Fraser Mustard Centre, University of South Australia

ORCID: 0000-0001-7538-4844

Sally is a social epidemiologist with the majority of her research focusing on societies' impact on child development.

Sally is Professor UniSA Education Futures. Sally is also the Co-Director of the Fraser Mustard Centre.

Sally is well known for spearheading the use of the Early Development Instrument (EDI) in Australia, being the first to pilot the instrument outside of Canada. Sally continues to work across the country to help facilitate the use of the Australian EDI (the AEDI) working with communities, service providers and governments.

Locally, Sally consults to the Department of Child Protection policy directorate primarily around data linkage, the children's centres operational group around evaluation, and the SA AEDI team around community advocacy and research translation. Internationally, Sally works with governments and donor organisations such as the World Bank, UNICEF, AusAID and the Bernard Van Leer Foundation working with various measures of child development for monitoring and evaluation purposes.

Sally has over 100 publications including books, chapters, monographs and journal articles covering topics such as infant mouthing behaviours, child physical activity and nutrition levels, the measurement of alcohol related violence, the evaluation of teenage pregnancy prevention programs, how child development varies across communities and the impact of socio economics and service integration on child development.

As such Sally brings locally, nationally and internationally recognised epidemiological skills particularly in relation to population monitoring of child development and education. She has a commitment to practical, pragmatic and translatable research.