Deputy Dean: Research
Deputy Dean: Research
Qualifications
Research interests
Biography
Prior to academia Dr Swanzen worked in child and family welfare, adolescent mental health, community development, residential care, foster care training and practice model development. During her professional practice she obtained her master’s degree in clinical social work, cum laude, and completed her doctoral study by the age of 31 with the development of a classification system for describing childhood social functioning challenges. During 2008 Dr Swanzen served as the project manager on national- and provincial level research projects, focusing on supporting orphaned and vulnerable children in the community and the effectiveness of diversion programmes for youth in conflict with the law, respectively. Since joining academia Dr Swanzen’s research focused on juvenile justice, service-learning, social entrepreneurship, paediatric palliative care, professional supervision, generations, residential child and youth care, parenting, and professional supervision. Her work received various campus awards, and she served as journal editor, peer reviewer for 10 journals, conference chair and moderator, external examiner, and ministerial appointee to the South African Council for Social Service Professions. From 2015-2018 I held the position of Adjunct Associate Professor with the Caulfield campus of Monash University. She authored 5 conference proceedings, 8 book chapters, 20 journal articles and 1 book between 2007 and 2025. In the same period, she presented at 27 conferences.
Deputy Dean: Research
Deputy Dean: Research
Qualifications
Research interests
Biography
Prior to academia Dr Swanzen worked in child and family welfare, adolescent mental health, community development, residential care, foster care training and practice model development. During her professional practice she obtained her master’s degree in clinical social work, cum laude, and completed her doctoral study by the age of 31 with the development of a classification system for describing childhood social functioning challenges. During 2008 Dr Swanzen served as the project manager on national- and provincial level research projects, focusing on supporting orphaned and vulnerable children in the community and the effectiveness of diversion programmes for youth in conflict with the law, respectively. Since joining academia Dr Swanzen’s research focused on juvenile justice, service-learning, social entrepreneurship, paediatric palliative care, professional supervision, generations, residential child and youth care, parenting, and professional supervision. Her work received various campus awards, and she served as journal editor, peer reviewer for 10 journals, conference chair and moderator, external examiner, and ministerial appointee to the South African Council for Social Service Professions. From 2015-2018 I held the position of Adjunct Associate Professor with the Caulfield campus of Monash University. She authored 5 conference proceedings, 8 book chapters, 20 journal articles and 1 book between 2007 and 2025. In the same period, she presented at 27 conferences.
An educational brand of The Independent Institute of Education
Formed by the strategic evolution of The IIE's Varsity College, IIE MSA, Vega and
the School of Hospitality and Service Management, uniting under the Emeris name.
Emeris is an educational brand of The Independent Institute of Education (Pty) Ltd which is registered with the Department of Higher Education and Training as a private higher education institution under the Higher Education Act, 1997 (reg. no. 2007/HE07/002). Company registration number: 1987/004754/07. View certificate here.
Back
