Working in solidarity with lived experience experts is at the core of everything we do at the RESTORE Centre. Our approach is not simply to involve people with lived experience as “participants”, but to engage in genuine co-production and co-leadership across all levels of the CRE. We strive to stand with (rather than speak for) people with lived experience; share power and work collaboratively; and stay accountable to lived experience experts and to each other.

The RESTORE Centre has collaborations with established groups of lived experience experts who will inform our governance, research activities and knowledge translation.
These include:

• The WEAVERs at The University of Melbourne - The WEAVERs are a group of women who have experienced domestic, family violence and/or sexual violence and who play a role in ‘weaving’ lived experience into research and training at the University of Melbourne. The group was established in 2016 by MAEVE with funding from the Melbourne Social Equity Institute (MSEI).

• The ALIVE Lived Experience Research Collective provides opportunities for mental health researchers with lived experience carer/family researchers in universities, community or government to access mentoring/training.

• The ALIVE Centre Co-Design Living Labs Network brings >2000 people with lived experience of mental ill-health from community settings for co-design.