Helen Fordham joined the School of Media and Communications at the University of Western Australia in 2015 as the Coordinator of the newly-established Master's of Strategic Communications. Currently she teaches journalism, professional writing, strategic planning and digital communications and her students have collaborated on a range of industry projects for partners like the WA Museum, WA Newspapers, and Fire and Emergency Services.

Prior to her appointment at UWA Helen taught public relations, professional writing and social media marketing at the University of Notre Dame Australia; feature writing, cultural theory and creative non-fiction at Curtin University; and Strategic Corporate Communications at Edith Cowan University.

Helen has a Bachelor of Arts in Chinese History from the University of Western Australia; a Master of Journalism from Michigan State University and a PhD from Curtin University in Communications and Cultural Theory. She also has post graduate qualifications in management from the University of Queensland and in higher education teaching from the University of Notre Dame Australia. She is a graduate of the Pacific Institute Leadership Program and she is a past recipient of an International Rotary Scholarship and Curtin University Post Graduate Scholarship.

Included in Helen’s research interests are the history of intellectual thought; public service and investigative journalism; 20^th century press criticism; Indigenous memoir; and social activism. She is a co-investigator on the Healthways Changing the Conversation Grant, which examines the role of the media in primary intervention in family and domestic violence. She also sits on the Arthur Lovekin Prize for Journalism Excellence Committee and she is the School Honours Coordinator.

Before entering academia Helen worked in print journalism in Australia and the United States and in legal publishing, environmental journalism and business reporting.  She has also worked as a senior executive and communications strategist for a range of organisations including the Australian Broadcasting Corporation; the Australian Government Solicitors Office, the Queensland Law Society, the Michigan State Medical Society and the Western Australian Department’s of Land Administration, Communities and Water.