Meet the CIRCA team! Today we are introducing Lena Etuk, CIRCA’s Research and Evaluation Director
What’s your favourite thing about working at CIRCA?
I can’t name just one favourite thing! It’s the people, the really supportive workplace where I get to be my whole self and am appreciated for it, and the fact we do socially impactful research.
What drew you to working in this space originally?
After working as an applied sociologist for 13 years on topics that didn’t have much at all to do with race or ethnicity, I was looking for an opportunity to bring ethnicity and identity back into my social science research. I saw it as an opportunity to bring myself and my lived experience to a great research firm.
What has been your favourite project in your time at CIRCA?
My favourite projects have been the ones where I’ve learned about topics I didn’t know a lot about, and where we could bring really important insights to a client who was eager to learn from them. Like about interment. We had a couple of projects for Southern Metropolitan Cemeteries NSW where we explored the interment preferences of different CALD cohorts and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Those projects were really interesting because I hadn’t realised there were so many options for commemorating the end-of-life. It prompted me to think about my own interment preferences and to talk to my family members about what they would like. SMCNSW was also a great client, which was engaged in the whole research process and have applied the research insights to their work.
What’s a fun fact about you?
I’m an avid horse-back-rider, with 30+ years’ experience working with horses! I train and compete in Dressage and lease a wonderful horse out in far northwest Sydney.
You can read the profiles of Lena and the rest of our team here: https://www.circaresearch.com.au/team/
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