Professor Rosemary Sheehan AM

Professor Rosemary Sheehan AM B.Soc.Stud (Syd), MSW (LaT), PhD (Monash), works in the Department of Social Work, Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, Monash University.

Professor Sheehan has 17 years’ experience as a Dispute Resolution Convenor in the Children's Court of Victoria and has until recently been a Member of both the Women’s Correctional Services Advisory Committee (2004-12) and the Child Death Review Committee (2010-13).

She is a Member of MacKillop Family Services Quality and Advocacy Committee, a peak social welfare agency in Victoria, and a Council Member of Mannix College, the Catholic residential College affiliated with Monash University. She also provided academic consultancy for the Victorian Government’s review of child protection legislation (2002- 2003).

Professor Sheehan teaches mental health in Monash undergraduate and postgraduate social work programs and co-ordinates the Higher Degrees by Research and Master of Social Work (Forensic Studies) programmes. 

Her published research covers a range of areas including child welfare and the law, family violence, mental health, and judicial and corrections responses to offenders, with particular reference to women offenders (see books Children and the Law: International approaches to children and their vulnerabilities with A/Prof Helen Rhoades and Prof Nicky Stanley and Australia’s Children’s Courts Today and Tomorrow, with Allan Borowski).

Her current research projects include: Management of sexual abuse cases in the Family Division of the Children’s Court Victoria, a specialist list project implemented in 2013 and currently being evaluated; and a longitudinal study of Women exiting prison: addressing their needs, with the Department of Justice Victoria.