Renee Van Aaken

Director, Delivery Performance and Culture, Correctional Services, New South Wales Department of Communities and Justice, Australia

Renee is an experienced leader in the Criminal Justice sector, with extensive and diverse skill in criminal justice including operational, management and strategic areas. After completing a Criminology degree in 2001, Renee worked with Corrections Victoria before relocating to Corrective Services NSW in 2007. After several years in frontline operational and management roles in correctional centres she was promoted in a leadership role 2012. Renee then moved into project management where for the past 6 years she has led and managed multiple agency initiatives, large scale reforms and restructures, including the NSW Government’s Strategy to Reduce Reoffending Program and the Premier’s Priority to Reduce Recidivism. In 2021 she graduated with Honours in a Master of Business Administration (MBA). Renee is passionate about making a difference, for people impacted by the criminal justice system and those working within what is a very challenging system. She is driven to implement change effectively and is currently focussed on a number of projects supporting the Premier’s Priority. A new and exciting area interest for Renee is correctional technology, leading the development and implementation a business case for a $40m program to transform prisoner rehabilitation through technology. She has presented on this topic at the recent International Corrections and Prisons Association (ICPA) conference in Florida in 2022, and recently published an article in Justice Trends Volume 10.

Dr Rohan Lulham

Seniour Lecturer in Design, University of Sydney, Australia

Dr Rohan Lulham is a Senior Lecturer in Design at the University of Sydney. His research explores the capacity of design to create social change and growth with a particular focus on transforming the criminal justice system. With a background in psychology and architecture, as well as experience working as a psychologist in youth justice, Rohan’s research often intersects across design, criminology, and psychology with affect often being a core construct. Developing new knowledge through undertaking practice-led design research projects is an important aspect of his research. Over the last ten years Rohan has led several large design research collaborations including projects on prison education, prison industries, community legal services, appearing in court from custody via video links, therapeutic youth justice units, acute mental units, and prisoner access to digital technology. Looking to create impact and build pathways to alternative approaches to criminal justice, he is an active member of International Corrections and Prison Association where he advocates for how inclusive, participatory design can assist in realising more humane and productive systems of justice.