Judy Charnaud OAM, BSc (Geol), Dip Ed, FGAA.

For many reasons over the years I have been asked to write a brief profile and I find it very difficult as I have been lucky enough to have had an amazingly varied, interesting and dare I say looong life, so picking out the fundamentals is hard. Born and bred on the Northern Beaches of Sydney, a fantastically free childhood, a varied career - senior secondary science teacher, geology coordinator, costume maker for school musicals and Rock Eisteddfods; designing, and implementing school and community environmental education programs throughout NSW; working as a geologist with a large multi-national mining company; running avolunteer program in Oecusse Timor leste, along with many and varied hobbies has kept me busy over these many years.
Travels in my early twenties included a year hitching around the United Kingdom and then following the “Hippie” trail” back home via Brussels, Germany, Yugoslavia, Greece, Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, India, Bangkok and Singapore with a final flight to Darwin and then hitching back to Sydney. Further trips to South America and through outback Australia have given me a wide perspective of the global situation. Marriage and two children put a stop to my wanderlust for a while.
In 1999, needing a break from teaching, I went to work with an Australian based NGO, OzGREEN, running ground breaking environmental programs such as “Kids, Companies, Creeks”, MyRiver, YouthLEAD and the Great Eastern Ranges biodiversity corridor.
Since 2001 I have been Program Manager of a project in Timor leste, Sustainable Villages Oecusse, which is a community based, transformative program whereby Villagers are empowered to analyse their environment and design a unique, site specific vision to build a socially and ecologically sustainable community. I saw the desperate need for youth activities in Oecusse so initiated the Youth in Action Program which includes environmental education, sport and leadership activities. In 2020 I was awarded the Medal of the Order Australia, (OAM) for service to conservation and environment in Timor leste.
In 2014 I joined the Rotary E-Club of Greater Sydney enabling me to have my project recognized by RAWCS (Rotary Australia World Community Service) and also to meet with many like-minded people with globally important humanitarian projects to their name.
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