153. Changing the Story, with student Neeve Blackham-Jennings, Mandy Bamford & Nicki Mitchell

Neeve Blackham-Jennings is a school student who wrote and illustrated what ‘accidentally’ became an award-winning book when she was fifteen. It’s a story that hoped to change a story – the story of Australia’s most endangered reptile, the Western Swamp Tortoise. But that’s not the half of it.

Last September’s Quantum Words Festival in Perth opened with Schools Day. I was fortunate to host Bruce Pascoe later in the day, which you may have heard on episode 140. But opening the festival was this session, featuring Neeve alongside a couple of brilliant women whose chance encounters with Neeve continue to reverberate, as they work to bring this species back from the brink of extinction.

Mandy Bamford is an ecologist and environmental communicator, fascinated by innovative ways to engage people with nature. And Nicki Mitchell is an award-winning tertiary educator and Associate Professor of Conservation Biology at UWA.

Their work includes the rehabilitation of wetland habitats, and the translocation of zoo-bred animals to nature reserves – joining forces with passionate community members, including young people like Neeve, to enable more positive stories of change. We talk about all this, and related topics of voting age, media and more, with some terrific student questions.

24.00 - Q&A starts with Lyn Beazley AO, on the effect of global warming ‘feminising’ the genders of many species
24.45 - Student question on the ethics of species translocation
26.00 - Question on some of the pioneers in this space
27.45 - Anthony asks Neeve her thoughts on the voting age
28.55 - Student question on how literature can affect social issues besides conservation
31.30 - Student question on other endangered species like the numbats
32.30 - Anthony asks if anyone’s studying journalism - and what we need and might do in media
35.50 - Student question on what’s driven the Western Swamp Tortoise decline

Head here for automatic cues to those chapter markers.

This conversation was recorded in the theatre at John Curtin College of the Arts in Walyalup/Fremantle, on 16 September 2022.

Title slide: Nicki Mitchell, Mandy Bamford & high school student Neeve Blackham-Jennings (pic: Olivia Cheng).

See more photos of this & other events including some behind the scenes stuff by

Join us for a journey on the Murray River, Australia, for the first Confluence 2026.

Pre-roll music: River, by Onyx Music (sourced from Artlist). 

Chapters

• 25:41 Q&A starts with Lyn Beazley AO, on the effect of global warming ‘feminising’ the genders of many species
• 26:26 Student question on the ethics of species translocation
• 27:41 Question on some of the pioneers in this space
• 29:26 Anthony asks Neeve her thoughts on the voting age
• 30:36 Student question on how literature can affect social issues besides conservation
• 33:11 Student question on other endangered species like the numbats
• 34:11 Anthony asks if anyone’s studying journalism - and what we need and might do in media
• 37:31 Student question on what’s driven the Western Swamp Tortoise decline