Hi, I’m Ashlee.

Welcome to my online portfolio.

I am an experienced writer, communicator, researcher and project manager with a strong interest in international aid and development policy and the Asia-Pacific region.

I currently work part-time as an independent development consultant, and part-time as the Communications and Visibility Manager for the Australian Humanitarian Partnership, a DFAT-funded initiative. 

Previously I was the Centre Manager at the Development Policy Centre at The Australian National University in Canberra. I worked at Devpolicy for nearly a decade, on communications, project management, research support, policy analysis, conferences (including the Australasian Aid Conference) and the Devpolicy Blog, and significantly contributing to the centre’s growth and increasing visibility.

I have also worked with Plan International in Timor-Leste, the Center for International Forestry Research in Indonesia and Media Monitors, as well as in a variety of other freelance writing and editing roles.

As a journalist and editor, I worked at the Jakarta Globe from 2008-2010 and for News Ltd community newspapers and the Courier News group in Sydney from 2005-2008. My writing, analysis and reportage has also been published in numerous media outlets.

I finished a Master of Public Policy (Development Policy) at ANU in 2011, which included a semester at the American University School of International Service in Washington DC. I also have a Bachelor of Arts in Communications (Journalism) from the University of Technology, Sydney.

You can read more about my work and professional background, or you can just browse through my portfolio–expand the menu by clicking in the top left corner.

 

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WHD2021 comms campaign for the Australian Humanitarian Partnership

In my role at the Australian Humanitarian Partnership Support Unit, I put together a social media campaign for World Humanitarian Day 2021. The theme was the urgent need for climate action to support the world’s most vulnerable.

The campaign included an Adobe Spark interactive on the work the DFAT-supported Disaster READY program undertakes to build resilience to climate-related disasters in Pacific communities, which was shared by Australia’s Humanitarian Coordinator, James Gilling. View the interactive here.

The social media campaign also shared the views of more than 21 humanitarians from across Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Vanuatu, Timor-Leste and Samoa through cross-platform social media content (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram grid and stories). These posts highlighted the impact that climate change was having on Pacific peoples’ work as humanitarians, and in their communities.

Example:

Parliamentary aid oversight: time for a new approach

Co-authored with Stephen Howes, this blog post further analysed our work on parliamentary aid oversight. We were invited to parliament to speak about the issues outlined with the Foreign Affairs and Aid Subcommittee of the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade.

read blog >>

Australian Aid Tracker

Launched in January 2016, the Australian Aid Tracker website draws on a range of data and Devpolicy analysis, and uses a variety of visualisation and charting tools to help bring the numbers on Australian aid to life. It’s an independent, user-friendly and up-to-date look at Australian aid.

Ashlee Betteridge created and built the aid tracker site, with support from colleagues (particularly Terence Wood).

The aid tracker had a hugely positive response, attracting interest from media, aid stakeholders and the general public. It was widely shared on social media on its launch.

Related Devpolicy Blog posts:

Introducing the Australian Aid Tracker by Ashlee Betteridge
Is Australia a humanitarian scrooge? By Ashlee Betteridge
The rise of global aid in 2015, and the fall of Australia by Robin Davies and Ashlee Betteridge

Multimedia:

Quiz
Infographic

Media coverage:

New independent ‘Tracker’ website for Aussie Aid, Radio Australia, 27 January.
Australian Aid Tracker Shows PNG And Indonesia Receive Most Funds But Pot Is Getting Smaller, Huffington Post, 27 January.
New ANU website tracks changes to Australian Aid, ANU, 28 January.
Devpolicy launches Australian aid tracker, Crawford School, 27 January.

Screen Shot 2016-01-28 at 4.51.01 PM

Tweet from the Vice Chancellor of the Australian National University.

Policy brief — Communication post-integration: reloading Australia’s efforts

In August 2016, Ashlee authored a Development Policy Centre policy brief titled ‘Communication post-integration: reloading Australia’s efforts’. The brief looked at why it is important to invest in aid communication, with a focus on web and social media, and gave suggestions for how DFAT can do better. It included qualitative and quantitative analysis of aid communication on the DFAT website and on Twitter, and compared DFAT’s efforts with those of other aid donors.

Download the policy brief [PDF].

Three part blog series
The need to resurrect aid communication efforts
Australian aid communications by the numbers
DFAT and aid communications: how to improve