Claire is a Torres Strait Islander (Maluilgal from the western islands) who grew up on Badu Island. She has a Bachelor of Education from James Cook University and started her career as a primary school teacher. Motivated by the drive to improve the educational outcomes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students on a large scale, she took up the opportunity to move to Canberra to work in the Australian Public Service (APS). Throughout her APS career, Claire has undertaken various leadership, policy, coordination and program management roles, across a range of agencies, including the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, the Australian Public Service Commission, the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and the National Indigenous Australians Agency.

Education has been an area of significant focus throughout Claire’s career. She has worked predominantly on national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education policy and managed a range of flagship government initiatives and programs aimed at improving education outcomes. She has a Master of Business Administration from the University of Canberra and recently completed her PhD at the Australian National University, under a Sir Roland Wilson Pat Turner scholarship. Claire’s thesis (currently under examination) focused on the Commonwealth’s role in redressing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander educational inequity.

Claire is a senior executive at the Commonwealth Department of Education and leads the Research Policy and Programs branch. Her branch aims to ensure that Australian researchers have access to cutting edge national research infrastructure and that the research system is meeting the current and future needs of research students and the research sector.

Supervisor: Professor Nicholas Biddle

Publications

 
  • Sainsbury C (2024) The mismatch between rhetoric and action - A study into the Commonwealth's role in redressing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander educational inequity [PhD Thesis], The Australian National University, Canberra.

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