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Chief Executive Officer
CEO Saxon Rice has extensive experience across the VET and employment services sectors as well as the public policy process. Ms Rice previously held a range of senior government, VET and management positions. She was Assistant Minister for Technical and Further Education in the former Queensland Government from 2012 to 2015, and Chair of the then Ministerial Industry Commission responsible for industry engagement.
Ms Rice is a former Director of Global Business Development for an Australian employment services company and was responsible for significant growth into new countries in the European and Asian markets. Ms Rice has also served in a range of Senate Committee Secretariats, including as Acting Secretary and Principal Research Officer to the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee. More recently, she was a Member of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal from 2016 to 2018 and is a Member and Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
Ms Rice commenced as a Commissioner of ASQA on 16 April 2018, before being appointed as Chief Commissioner and CEO (initially Acting) on 7 October 2019. Following legislative changes to the governance of ASQA, with effect from 1 January 2021, Ms Rice was appointed CEO for a period of 5 years, and she has since been reappointed to 30 June 2027.
Deputy Chief Executive Officer
Katerina Lawler has extensive experience across Australian governments, having worked at ACT, NSW and Commonwealth levels. Her career spans a broad range of policy areas, including housing policy and funding, the arts, higher education, and vocational education and training.
Kat has joined ASQA in an acting capacity from the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR), where she is Assistant Secretary, VET Quality and Regulation. In this role, she has worked closely with ASQA over a number of years and led significant national policy reforms, including development of the 2025 Standards for Registered Training Organisations. Kat has also led work on a range of VET quality and integrity initiatives, including the 2023 reforms to the National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act and Commonwealth–State initiatives to support, grow and retain the VET workforce.
Senior Leadership
Ty Emerson, Executive Director, Transformation and Reform: Policy and Education advice to inform the VET sector and whole of government regulatory reform, Internal Reviews and Tribunal matters, and ASQA’s Digital Transformation. Ty is also ASQA’s Diversity Champion, and Privacy Champion.
Sharayne Given, acting Executive Director, Registration and Performance: Continuous Improvement, Innovation and Data, as well as carrying responsibility for regulatory teams including Market Entry, Registration, Service Delivery, and Performance Monitoring.
Denise Lowe-Carlus, Executive Director, ASQA Strategic Projects: Future options for market entry, advancing a differentiated regulatory approach, biannual reporting to Government.
Greg Simmons, acting Executive Director, Integrity and Compliance: Intelligence, Compliance and Enforcement operations to prevent and detect threats to the integrity of VET. Also responsible for management of impacts on issued qualifications ensuring qualification validity.
Celeste Breen, acting Executive Director, Corporate and Enabling (Chief Operating Officer): Enabling services including People, Finance, Governance, Communications, Technology and Records.
Organisation structure
Below is ASQA’s national organisation structure, at April 2026.
