Wallea is a Behaviour Support Practitioner at Social Work & Co, working with NDIS participants and their families to understand behaviour, reduce distress, and build the kind of support that actually fits a person's life.

Her approach is grounded in curiosity. Before moving into behaviour support, Wallea spent a decade as a researcher and sociologist, studying how people communicate, build identity, and make sense of the world—particularly in communities where those things look different from the mainstream. That background shapes how she listens to families, how she reads data, and how she writes plans that support workers can actually follow. She believes the best behaviour support starts with genuinely understanding someone, not just their behaviour.

Wallea brings a neurodiversity-affirming lens to her practice, recognising that many behaviours of concern are expressions of unmet need or environmental mismatch rather than problems to be fixed. She works alongside families and support teams to build assessment processes that are transparent and defensible, and to develop plans that make sense to everyone who needs to use them—not just practitioners. She is based in the Hunter region of NSW and works remotely as part of the Social Work & Co team under the supervision of Natalie Love.