Associate Professor Belinda Cash is a social worker with clinical and academic expertise in mental health and social gerontology. Her work primarily focuses on understanding and addressing psychosocial and systemic issues impacting the health and wellbeing of older adults and their caregivers in rural Australia. Belinda is Chair of the Charles Sturt Ageing Well Research Group and co-lead of the Ageing Well in Rural and Regional Australia research program. She is a researcher with the Manna Institute for rural mental health and oversees research governance for Equally Well. These roles all support her primary objective of working with likeminded people who are passionate about improving access and opportunities for better health and wellbeing for rural Australians. Belinda is a Distinguished Member of the Australian Association of Gerontology, awarded for her extensive contributions to supporting student and early career researchers. She is an active supervisor of research students across multiple programs, has led several international programs exploring social welfare and wellbeing in the international context and continues to support students completing field-based learning in social work. She loves cooking, reading, theatre and travel. Since the pandemic quashed her many holiday dreams, she took up novel writing and is currently putting the finishing touches on her first rural crime novel. Belinda teaches into the social work and gerontology programs at Charles Sturt. Her teaching interests focus on social gerontology, mental health, and social research methods, though she has taught into a broad range of subjects within social work, allied health, and gerontology both at Charles Sturt and previously at La Trobe University. Belinda supervises Honours, Masters and Doctoral research students and provides academic liaison for students completing field education placements. She is also an academic lead for student mobility programs, which provide opportunities for Charles Sturt students to explore social work in international contexts. Belinda's research primarily focuses on understanding and addressing psychosocial and systemic issues impacting the health and wellbeing of older adults and their caregivers in rural Australia. She supervises research students at all levels, including current PhD candidates pursuing topics related to rural ageing and caregiving, protective factors for mental health and wellbeing, the implementation of trauma-informed mental health practice and assisted dying. Belinda is active in several key research leadership roles, including: These roles all support her primary objective of working with likeminded people who are passionate about improving access and opportunities for better health and wellbeing for rural Australians.
Professorial Staff
Associate Professor Belinda Cash
Associate Professor in Social Work and Gerontology
Albury / Wodonga
Building 763
Teaching