One of Australia's leading psychologists, Nyamal woman Tracy Westerman AM, has said the exclusion of her work in the national psychology curriculum is the reality of being an Aboriginal woman.
Dr Westerman has been widely recognised for her work in trying to reduce the burden of mental ill and health and suicide in Indigenous communities.
On Tuesday, she tweeted her dismay at her "complete exclusion from the AHPRA psychology curriculum".
Dr Westerman highlighted a picture of a university curriculum used by one of her students, which claimed: "Currently no known formal psychological tests have been developed specifically for use with Indigenous people that provide current-day norms and measurement statistics for Indigenous test takers."
One of my students has just messaged me yet again raising my complete exclusion from the AHPRA psychology curriculum and noting the claim that there are no culturally valid tools for Aboriginal ppl. Pity I developed mine in 2003; validated again in 2007 & about to publish again… pic.twitter.com/eroNLm2kFP
— Dr Tracy Westerman AM (@TracyWesterman) March 12, 2024
However, this seems to disregard the critical work done by the 2018 Australian of the Year (WA), especially in reference to culturally valid tools for Indigenous people.
She tweeted: "Pity I developed mine in 2003; validated again in 2007 & about to publish again on national norms."
Dr Westerman's PhD research saw the development of the only culturally and clinically validated screening tool for Aboriginal people at risk, which was cited by Canada as best practice in 2009.
She has personally funded their development and more recently has paid for the tests to be digitised to enable the capturing of critical data in real time for the first time in Australia. Vitally, accredited practitioners can literally screen for Aboriginal people at risk on their phone or computer.
Her personally funded work has captured the first ever national clinical norms on Indigenous youth mental health and suicide behaviours prevalence involving 1266 Indigenous youths which will shortly be published, representing another Australian first.
Dr Westerman tweeted: "It's extremely disappointing that this is the case but welcome to being an Aboriginal woman who has a yardstick significantly greater than anyone else's."
It is understood neither the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (ARPHRA) nor the Australian Psychological Society (APS) have approached Dr Westerman regarding information about her work, nor provided any support to her Indigenous psychology scholarship program, which now supports 55 future Indigenous psychologists and relies on public donations.
Dr Westerman told National Indigenous Times: "If this exclusion can occur for someone of my track record; imagine what my students are experiencing."
"Psychology prides itself on being based on a 'scientist-practitioner model – the science informs practice," she said.
"Yet it seems that science, when developed by an Indigenous person is very readily excluded."
