Jimi Bursaw

• Lead a multidisciplinary team of social workers, educators, migration agents, and solicitors, delivering Educational Advocacy, Welfare and Wellbeing, Job Preparation, Legal Advice, and Visa and Migration Support.
• Drive service redesign, policy influence, partnership engagement, and developmental learning initiatives to enhance equity, capability, and student success across UQ.
• Transformed the service from appointment-heavy to a tiered, prevention-incorporated support model, doubling student reach, and improving staff workload and well-being.
• Shifted job prep and welfare/wellbeing to 75% proactive outreach, tripling student engagement, and reducing individual appointment demand.
• Redesigned seasonal peak-time Visa and Academic Advocacy service operations, increasing student intake while reducing staff labor.
• Introduced developmental approaches to advocacy, increasing student problem-solving capability, navigation confidence, and academic agency.
• Built strong partnerships with faculties, student services, governance units, and policy stewards to advance student-centered solutions, early intervention, and policy influence.
• Initiated or co-led major UQ policy reviews, including: Student Progression, Academic and Financial Liability Removal, Accessible Learning, and International Student Interruptions.
• SAS Services directly delivered over $2.5 million in financial benefits for students annually since 2023 through zero-cost appointments, fee reversals, case resolution, successful appeals, financial first aid, and targeted early interventions.

• Led several project teams in co-curricular learning strategies, student partnership initiatives, communications ecosystems, and retention-focused developmental programs across a large and diverse faculty.
• Partnered with executives, governance committees, academics, students, and professional staff to strengthen success, wellbeing, belonging, academic transition and retention.
• Led curricular and co-curricular project teams to foster student belonging, academic identity, student retention, capability development, and employability.
• Co-led redevelopment of At-Risk Student practices, leading to new interventions and working models supporting retention and early identification.
• Reviewed and advised on faculty-wide initiatives, policies, and procedures; reported to executives, deans, and governance committees.
• Co-Lead (with students) UQ’s first student-run communications team, multi-channel digital engagement strategy.
• Led student–staff partnership projects (HASS Helps, The Fail Project) that revealed key lived-experience barriers to academic success and informed service redesign for increased retention.
• Standardised student representation policy, selection processes, training, communities of practice and governance alignment across the faculty.
• Led creation of student communications, tools, and student-facing transition resources for UQ’s major curriculum/degree restructure.
• Designed and delivered transition, pedagogy, and capability-building resources for teaching staff during the COVID-driven shift to online learning.
• Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences

• Provided consulting, facilitation, and bespoke developmental learning design for leadership capability, experiential education, organisational development, and student experience strategy.
• Clients include: Amazon Web Services Brisbane, Griffith Honours College, Cottee Parker Architecture, Atira, UniLodge, Student One, and individual professionals.

• Architect of institution-wide strategies for co-curricular learning, leadership development, volunteering, orientation, wellbeing, service-learning, and campus culture.
• Led multiple large-scale learning systems, high-performing teams, and multi-year institutional transformation.
• Designed and implemented a central university co-curricular development ecosystem to foster campus culture and student retention, integrating graduate capability development, employability, wellbeing, service-learning, and platforms for student leadership and campus community development.
• Expanded orientation from a 5-hour admin session into a five-day experiential transition program, improving relationship building, confidence, belonging, and first-year outcomes.
• Led the Leadership, Development & Innovation (LDI) Program, scaling from 12 students to 3000+ members delivering: 150–300 workshops/year, 120+ workshop topics, 30+ facilitators/instructors, 3–6 annual retreats, conferences, incubators, intensives.
• Oversaw QUT College of Excellence, partnered on VC Scholars & Prestige Scholarships programs, and supported high-achieving student development.
• Directed co-curricular service-learning strategy: 120+ annual placements, experiential curriculum oversight, and gatekeeping of all co-curricular service-learning offerings.
• Increased participation of identified equity student populations in student leadership development and engagement by 200–400%, ensuring inclusive high-impact experiences.
• Secured or co-led $3M+ in funding for leadership, wellbeing, community engagement, resilience, retention, and campus culture improvement initiatives.
• Integrated careers, counselling, wellbeing, volunteering, and leadership into a whole-of-person development model, significantly improving coherence and impact.
• Managed professional staff, paraprofessionals, student interns, and large instructor teams while embedding reflective practice, evaluation, and iteration.

Lecturer & Tutor in EDB004 and LCB006 – Inclusive Education course based on a Service-Learning model.

Part of a writing team 2013-2014 on reflective practices and Service-Learning praxis in tertiary education.

Lecturer: Arts in Education.
Regular Guest Lecturer: Diversity in Education, Learning, Mind and Education
Tutor: Arts in Education; Diversity in Education; Learning, Mind and Education
Online Moderator/Facilitator: AITSL Leading Curriculum Change program (Australian National Curriculum)

Led co-curricular living-learning community and leadership programs, Manager of Pond Road Residence (New College), and Calumet & Bethune College Residences.

Managing one-two residence building consisting of approximately 600 first and upper year students.

Managing, training, developing and evaluating approximately 20-50 student staff on four job-specific teams.

Co-development and co-facilitation of residence life and student leader training sessions and ongoing professional development for approximately 140 student leaders.

Management of student disciplinary cases and participation in university conduct hearings.

Development and management of an internationally-themed living learning community of 84 students.

Leadership on Campus Portfolio: member of cross-disciplinary team responsible for expanding on and implementing ongoing campus-wide training and development around leadership.

• Managed two residence halls (McKay and Heddon Halls) consisting of approximately 670 first and upper year students.
• Managing, training, developing and evaluating 21-23 student staff on two residence teams and participation in the selection and training of 300 student staff campus wide.
• Management of student disciplinary cases and participation in university hearings.
• Co-development and co-facilitation of residence life and student leader training sessions and ongoing professional development sessions.
• Service-Learning Portfolio: part of a small team responsible for the development, implementation, and facilitation of a new co-curricular service-learning program over two years involving 60-120 students annually.

Managed the Student Life Component of the NLU PACE Program and Co-Managed Baker Hall Residential College.

Designed co-curricular leadership and community development programs

Delivered curricular and co-curricular Social Skills Development programs for PACE Students

Managed Student Life Team, including 6 student staff and one professional staff working with university aged students with multiple learning disabilities (PACE students).

Management of PACE Residence Life Staff Team, Co-Management of mainstream Residence Life Team and a Residence Hall of 200 integrated students.

Innovate and implement a co-curricular program to facilitate a diverse living/learning community consisting of PACE, Graduate, First-Generation College, and Mainstream Undergraduate Students.

Faculty Responsibilities: Coordinated and taught modified curriculum courses on Social Skills and Drama and Theatre. Designed, Coordinated and taught undergraduate courses in Educational Psychology and Drama & Theatre joint with Northwestern University.