About

Our Team

Yanalangami is a division of the Tranby Aboriginal Co-operative. Tranby has been serving Community since 1957, providing life-changing accredited and non-accredited education programs by mob, for mob and with mob.

Our Yanalangami team are part of the Tranby family but predominately work to grow Yanalangami nationally and strengthen investment in the inherent leadership of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women.

Dr Belinda Russon

Tranby’s CEO

Jacinta Bailey

Yanalangami Program Manager

Bernice Hookey

Lead Yanalangami Facilitator

Dr Lisa Sarzin

Partnerships Consultant

Acknowledgement of Country

We acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the lands called Australia and pay our deep respects to Elders, both past and present, who are the carriers of wisdom, language, lore and Country. Yanalangami recognises our women, our matriarchs, as the backbone of Community. We are grateful to walk in your footsteps and humbled knowing that because of you, we can.

Our Yanalangami office is located on the unceded lands of the Gadigal peoples. We recognise and pay our respects to this land, acknowledging the Gadigal peoples’ unbroken connection and custodianship to the land, waterways and sky Country. Throughout Australia, everywhere we walk, always was and always will be, Aboriginal Land.

Yanalangami is powered by:
Tranby Aboriginal Co-operative Limited.

Email us: [email protected]

13 Mansfield st, Glebe
GADIGAL LAND
NSW Australia 2037

ABN: 82 479 284 570

We are a welcoming and safe space for LGBTQIA+SB identifying peoples. Tranby celebrates mob of diverse sexualities and genders.

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Dr Belinda Russon

Tranby’s CEO

Belinda is a proud descendant of the Yugambeh nation and a passionate social justice activist who has worked as the CEO of Tranby Aboriginal Co-operative Limited (Tranby) since 2012. Previously, she worked as a lawyer for Wirringa Baiya Aboriginal Women’s Legal Centre in Sydney.

Belinda leads the Tranby team who work actively to create educational opportunities and develop effective community projects for and with our Community. Tranby’s overarching vision is to educate Community, encourage achievement and empower our Mob; the Yanalangami: Strong Women, Strong Communities Program is just one leading example of this. 

Tranby has always been a place rich in stories and memories and recently received a grant to make Tranby a Keeping Place of Indigenous Knowledges- a place to make and share our Indigenous stories. As the Chair of the Rona Tranby Trust, Belinda is committed to working with Community to support the recording and preservation of Indigenous Australian Oral Histories.

A current board member of the Alliance of First Nations Independent Education & Training Providers, a national peak body, Belinda and the board work with other Indigenous education organizations to ensure that the educational interests of Community are well represented, and that self-determination and cultural wellbeing is prioritized.

Belinda is a Fulbright scholar and Churchill fellow and holds a Bachelor of Arts (USYD), Bachelor of Laws (UTS) and an LLM and SJD (UNSW).
Belinda is also the mother of three boys and is an intrepid traveler and avid reader.

Jacinta Bailey

Yanalangami Program Manager

Jacinta is an enthusiastic and driven ally who is passionate about community-led
development, life-long learning, gender equity, environmental sustainability and Indigenous self-determinate rights, both in Australia and abroad.

Initially starting as a Tranby research volunteer in 2017, Jacinta has since created and implemented various education projects, both locally and nationally, for Tranby students and community. As a community development professional, Jacinta focuses on co-designing non-accredited education programs that strengthen student’s spirit, tools, and pathways to lead change in their communities. 

Importantly, since 2019 Jacinta has co-developed the nationally significant Yanalangami: Strong Women, Strong Communities program which connects, inspires, and invests in the inherent leadership skills of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander female Changemakers throughout Australia. 

Jacinta’s core objective is to bring people together, share stories, and expand our community engagement through big-picture projects that educate, inspire and empower Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. To achieve this, Jacinta is an avid grant writer, a curious human, and a driven community weaver.

Outside of Tranby, her passion for Indigenous self-determination, community-led change and educational empowerment, has seen Jacinta live and work with the Achuar Peoples of Kuserua in the Amazon Rainforest of Ecuador, where she assists the local community to run a small not for profit school that empowers their community through language learning on country and through Indigenous pedagogies.

Bernice Hookey

Lead Yanalangami Facilitator

Bernice is a proud Waanyi woman, mum and Changemaker. She is an accomplished speaker, author, mentor and leader. While a student at Tranby, Bernice learned new business skills and enhanced her confidence as a leader by learning alongside other Aboriginal students from around the country.

After completing her studies, she embarked on a journey of leadership and founded MZB Empowerment to improve the quality of life for Mob. She is a voice for the voiceless. In her work as our Lead Yanalangami Facilitator, Bernice seeks to strengthen the empowerment of individuals through unique program delivery in a culturally safe environment. Bernice is committed to walking with other women along their leadership journeys and supporting them to thrive.

Dr Lisa Sarzin

Partnerships consultant

Lisa works part-time at Tranby supporting community initiatives and developing external relationships and partnerships with organizations that share Tranby’s values and that wish to support Tranby into the future. She invites individuals, communities and organizations to work and walk together with Tranby to achieve greater impact.

Lisa supports our Yanalangami team to grow nationally by sharing our vision and methods for change with those that are committed to walking with us to invest in the leadership of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander female Changemakers.

Lisa has a Bachelor of Business and a First-Class Honours degree in Law from UTS, a Master of Laws from the University of Sydney, a PhD from UTS, and has won numerous academic awards. She serves as an independent director on the Board of three not-for-profits in an honorary capacity, including the Rona Tranby Trust which supports the recording and preservation of Indigenous Australian oral history. Lisa is the co-author of Hand in Hand: Jewish and Indigenous people working together (2010).