Community involvement in research
Volunteer opportunities available to help Cancer Council WA make decisions about cancer research funding.
Cancer Council WA is the largest charitable funder of cancer research in Western Australia. Our research funding program is entirely community funded.
All researchers who apply for our funding must include community representatives in their research projects to ensure they involve the people the research is intended to benefit. In addition, all our research grant applications are reviewed by volunteer community representatives to help us ensure the research we fund is relevant to the WA community.
You can help make a difference to cancer research by becoming a volunteer community representative to review our research grant applications.
Community representatives are members of the public who have a personal connection to cancer, such as experience of cancer, caring for someone with cancer, a family member or friend diagnosed with cancer, or experience volunteering for a cancer-related organisation. No prior research experience is required.
How you can become a Community Member
Step 1: Register your details
Registrations are currently closed however if you are interested in this volunteer position, please contact us at cancercouncilwa.research@cancerwa.asn.au.
Step 2: Complete the training
Complete the two-hour online training and the two-hour face-to-face training designed to inform and prepare you to be involved in health and medical research. On completing this training, you may be interested in participating in research projects led by cancer researchers in Western Australian. Please click here to join the Consumer and Community Involvement program.
Step 3: Attend a workshop
Attend a half-day workshop to learn about how community members help Cancer Council WA make research funding decisions, by reviewing and assessing research grant applications. By completing this workshop you will be eligible to be involved in our assessment panels. Participation is entirely voluntary.
Assessment panels
Our assessment panels are primarily made up of scientists and researchers, with up to four community representatives.
Each grant assessment panel is required to review, assess and recommend applications for funding for particular grant schemes.
Panel members are given up to one month to complete their assessments for a grant scheme. Assessments are completed at home at your own pace. Some computer literacy is expected with MS Word, email and web-based platform as such as Microsoft Teams. The number of applications will vary. It takes between 2-6 hours to review and assess all the applications for a grant scheme.
Community Member commitments
| Expected no. of applications to review | This will vary depending on the year |
| Time to review | 2-6 hours to review and assess all applications |
| Meetings | 1-3 meetings a year held |
| Location of meetings | Cancer Council, Subiaco or Shenton Park |
| Time of meetings | 2-4 hours duration, 4.30pm on a weekday |
| Annual time commitment | 6-15 hours |
| Ongoing training | Panel members are required to complete a short refresher training course every 2 years |
| Other useful resources | See how Cancer Council WA funds cancer research
For details on our grant schemes visit our ‘Funding opportunities‘ and ‘Successful funding‘ pages |
See who is a current member of this committee.
Community Representatives involved in our committee / subcommittees:
| Diana Andrew | Joanne Blight | Dan Byles | Peter Colvin | Barbara Daniels |
| Julie Duxbury | Susan Hayes | Simon Hicks | Angela Hon | Kristen Huey |
| Irene Ioannakis | Cale Johnson | Mar Knox | Karen La | Wen-Jun Lee |
| Marissa MacDonald | Liam Munday | Olivia Thomas | Annabelle Wellham |
Positions on our panels are volunteer positions and no honoraria are paid, however approved out-of-pocket expenses are reimbursed.
For information on volunteering with Cancer Council WA please visit our volunteer page.
If you have any questions, please contact Research Funding Program Team on 9212 4333 or at cancercouncilwa.research@cancerwa.asn.au.