Professor Margaret Alston
Discipline Coordinator
Margaret Alston
Bio
Margaret Alston is Professor of Social Work and Human Services, and also Director of the Centre for Rural Social Research at Charles Sturt University . In 2005 she has been appointed to an Honorary Professorship at the University of Sydney . She has also been awarded an Edna Ryan award in 2005 for her services to improving the status of rural women and for mentoring women.
In 2003 she spent a month working in the Gender Division of the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation in Rome . She was invited under the visiting expert program to assess the impact of gender mainstreaming policy on rural women.
She has published widely in the field of rural social issues and is internationally recognised for her research into issues affecting rural Australia . She completed a study of Rural Women and Leadership, Breaking through the Grass Ceiling, funded by the Australian Research Council and published by Harwood Publishers, UK , in 2000. Her most recent co-edited book is Social Work Fields of Practice, Oxford University Press, 2001 and her co-authored book Research for Social Workers, Allen & Unwin, has gone into its second edition in 2003. Recent research projects include social impacts of drought, rural issues, rural women and sport, violence against women in rural areas, rural youth and employment and women and agriculture. She is currently working on the impacts of the drought on young people’s access to education in rural and remote areas.
Recent publications
Margaret Alston and Jenny McKinnon (eds) 2005. Fields of Social Work Practice 2 nd edition. Oxford University Press.
Margaret Alston and Wendy Bowles 2003. Research for Social Workers. 2 nd edition. Allen & Unwin, Sydney .
Margaret Alston and Jenny McKinnon (eds) 2001. Fields of Social Work Practice. Oxford University Press.
Margaret Alston 2000 Breaking through the Grass Ceiling: Women, Power and Leadership in Rural Australia . Harwood Publishers, England .
Margaret Alston and Wendy Bowles 1998. Research for Social Workers. Allen & Unwin, Sydney .
Margaret Alston 1995. Women on the Land: The Hidden Heart of Rural Australia , University of NSW Press, Sydney.
