Board

Carol Berg was born in New York City and holds degrees in music from University of Michigan and the City University of New York. Carol has spent 25 years in the field of music education and most recently taught music at Ascham (1982-1999), a private girls school in Sydney. She is Vice President of the NSW Chapter of The Australian Choral Association and a member of The Music Council of Australia. She served as a director on the Board of the Bundanon Trust (1999-2008). Interest in mental health led her to become involved with The Black Dog Institute, and in 2009 she became a member of the Board. Her first association with Lou’s Place was in setting up music sessions for clients and overseeing their specialist education programmes. Subsequently she went on to the Management Advisory Board of TMFI.

Jo Boney was born in England where she trained as a registered nurse at University College Hospital, London.  In Australia she worked in nursing education and was in the Faculty of Nursing, Sydney University for 13 years where she was Associate Dean for international students and postgraduate programmes for six years.  She has a Diploma in Nursing Education, a Bachelor of Advanced Nursing, a Masters of Clinical Nursing and a PhD in Nursing.  Jo has been involved with Lou’s Place since it first opened, as a volunteer where she conducted meditation sessions for clients and as a board member.  She was chair of the board from mid 2003 to 2007.

Julie Claridge has an honours degree in law as well as a Masters degree and a Bachelor of Arts. She has worked in project finance, mergers and acquisitions and corporate law.  She established knowledge management at one of Australia’s leading law firms and worked as business development manager for a small charity.  She joined the Lou’s Place management advisory board (the predecessor of the Board) at the end of 2003 and became chair in February 2007.  Other work in the not for profit sector has included honorary secretary of the Royal Women’s’ Hospital Foundation and voluntary positions in education.  She joined Lou’s Place as a volunteer in 2002.

Originally from California, Dr Sally Gibbons received her B.A. from Harvard University in biochemistry, her M.A. in counselling psychology from Lesley College, and her D.Phil. in philosophy from Oxford University. Her book, Kant’s Theory of Imagination: Bridging Gaps in Judgment and Experience, was published by Oxford University Press. Prior to moving to Sydney, she was the founding Associate Director of the Center for Society and Genetics at UCLA as well as an adjunct member of the UCLA Philosophy Department.  She designed and for several years taught with two biologists a yearlong course for first-year university students entitled “Biotechnology and Society”, in which she lectured on the ethical and social dimensions of new genetic technologies. She has also been in clinical practice as a psychotherapist.  Prior to UCLA, Sally taught at Georgetown and Yale universities.  She is currently writing her first novel.

Kim Last has been volunteering at Lou’s and the Marmalade Foundation since she moved to Sydney eight years ago. Kim is originally from California.  After graduating university with degrees in economics and accounting, she spent 15 years working in finance in the Silicon Valley high-tech industry.  Prior to moving to Sydney Kim spent ten years living and working in South East Asia.  During her time there she also served on the Board of Governors for two private international schools and was President of the AWA, an international women’s organization comprising more than 400 women from over 30 nationalities whose activities focused on community services and fund-raising for local charities in Malaysia.  Kim now runs a financial consulting company.