Jesse Gardner-Russell is the 2026 National President of The Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA), and PhD Candidate at the University of Melbourne Department of Surgery and Centre for Eye Research Australia. Jesse researches how neurons communicate with the vasculature in the eye and brain, to enable vision, and how to restore these mechanisms after stroke, which impacts an Australian every 11 minutes.
Jesse’s research has been published in prestigious journals, such as Nature Communications. For his research, Jesse was awarded the Dean’s Award for Excellence in Graduate Research, and the Association for Research in Vision and Opthalmology member in training best poster award, of over 5000 research students. For his leadership, he has been awarded the inaugural Dean’s Commendation for Excellence in Graduate Research Leadership.
Originally from regional Victoria, Jesse has completed his Bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry, Honours in Enteric Neuron Stem Cell Therapies, and Master of Biotechnology at the University of Melbourne, where he graduated as Valedictorian and Dean’s Honours List student.
Prior to being elected as the 2025 National President of CAPA, the peak representative body for all 570,000 postgraduate students, Jesse served as CAPA Board Chair, President and Board Chair at the University of Melbourne Graduate Student Association (GSA) from 2022-2024, Acting CEO of GSA in 2023 and later as General Secretary of GSA from 2024-2025, where he grew the organisation’s membership by a net increase of 12,000 graduate students. Jesse also successfully negotiated two, three-year funding agreements with the University of Melbourne, ensuring that GSA became the largest postgraduate student organisation in Australia, with a record ~$4 million in revenue. Jesse is the longest serving student member of the University of Melbourne Academic Board and was also an advisory Board member at Melbourne University Sport.
Jesse has led both local and national campaigns to improve the conditions of postgraduate students. As President of the GSA, he created the Breakfast Club Program, which feeds ~200 students per session, the Future Careers Expo which connects postgraduates with employers from outside of their traditional domain, and helped lead the successful restoration of the COVID-19 PhD Stipend Extension. Likewise, Jesse worked to increase the local University of Melbourne PhD stipend, by over $5,000 annually over his tenure, well above inflation.
On the engagement front, Jesse overhauled the Graduate Art Prize, resulting in the program receiving over 200 submissions in 2024, up from 70 in 2022. During his tenure, Jesse re-introduced the signature GSA Ball, and the President’s Welcome. Under his leadership, the GSA Ball sold all ~450 tickets in less than 3 minutes – a sign of the renewed engagement at the GSA.
As National President of CAPA, Jesse has been focused on rebuilding CAPA’s key skill: advocacy. Jesse has spearheaded CAPA’s work on increasing the PhD stipend base rate, alongside UA and the ACGR, CAPA’s campaign to expand commonwealth prac payments to allied health, alongside the HSU, and worked closely with 2025 CAPA International Officer, Weihong Liang, to establish the International Students Representative Council of Australia.
Alongside Weihong, Jesse has spearheaded recent action to reverse punitive changes to international student visa fees, particularly for 485 Temporary Graduate Visas. In 2024, Jesse alongside Vice President, Richard Lee and Weihong, were able to reverse the age eligibility changes for PhD candidates, from 35, back to 50.
Jesse has given testimony to numerous Federal and State parliamentary inquiries, including ones centred on university governance. Jesse worked alongside the NTEU and Chancellors Council, Jesse helped negotiate the ‘Joint Reform Proposal’ which has led to the expansion of postgraduate student representation across Victorian university governing bodies.
Jesse’s news media strategy has seen CAPA become a globally recognised voice in higher education, featuring in local media such as the ABC, Australian Financial Review, The Australian and the Herald Sun, as well as international coverage in The Guardian, The Times Higher Education, The PIE and even Nature Magazine, the world’s leading scientific journal.
Jesse is also a regular opinion columnist at The Times Higher Education and Future Campus, writing on higher education funding and policy. Jesse is a regular speaker at higher education sector conferences, such as Universities Australia, TEQSA and was also the first student speaker in recent history at the Australian Financial Review Higher Education Summit.
Under Jesse’s leadership, CAPA was named as a finalist for the 2026 PIEoneer Best Member Organisation, one of the most prestigious global higher education awards.
Contact Jesse Gardner Russell At: president@capa.edu.au
