Susan Rooney-Harding Founder

The Story Catcher

Susan is a documentary filmmaker and a creative qualitative data specialist. Her inquisitive and intuitive nature is central to her ability to capture meaningful stories for a greater purpose. 

She is a Multimedia Producer and is the founder of The Story Catchers, Stories for purpose.

Susan and Nerissa have co-created a methodology that uses film in for monitoring and evaluation, social impact measurement and human-centred design process. The methodology is used to create documentary-style reports of the findings.

Local, National and International organisations have used The Story Catchers services, organisations such as Indigenous Lands and Sea Corporation, Department of Planning Transport and Infrastructure, Department of Environment, Water and Natural Resources, Enel Green Power, Rural and Remote Mental Health and South Australian Murray Darling Basin Natural Resource Management Board to name a few.  

Prior to this role she was the ABC Open Producer for the River Murray Areas in South Australia. Her primary role was to up-skill regional community members to create media content for a variety of ABC online, television and radio platforms.

Content that Susan has created with communities has been seen on News 24, Landline, ABC Online, ABC Open, ABC Rural and the 730 Report.

Her work has been featured in exhibitions in the Sydney Museum, Adelaide Festival Centre, Northern Rivers National Portrait Prize at the Lismore Regional Gallery and Murray Bridge Regional Art Gallery, South Australian Living Artists (SALA).

Nerissa Walton - Associate 

MONITORING & EVALUATION SPECIALIST

Nerissa has wide experience in the application of program logic and theory of change and evaluations of public health, environment and Indigenous programs. She has developed Monitoring and Evaluation frameworks and has delivered evaluations across Australia as well as overseas.Nerissa has worked with Commonwealth, state, territory and local governments and in the non-government and academic sectors. She has experience in quantitative data collection and analysis, but is particularly interested in understanding the more intangible outcomes of programs through the application of techniques such as the Most Significant Change (MSC) technique, of which she has extensive knowledge and experience.

Nerissa has professional qualifications, holding a Bachelor of Applied Science (Environmental Health), a Graduate Certificate in Public Health and a Masters of International Development. She has demonstrated skills in producing clear and concise evaluation reports that meet the needs of various evaluation stakeholders.

Nerissa was brought on at the Indigenous Land Corporation (ILC) to lead the organisation’s Monitoring and Evaluation body of work. Most recently, Nerissa has led the development of carbon offsetting strategy and policy advice at the ILC, as well as the design, implementation, monitoring and communication of demonstration projects on Indigenous-held land, including the Fish River Fire Project.

Nerissa maintains an interest in innovative, collaborative and empowerment approaches to evaluation and how these can inform organisational learning and change.