In addition to being ACSES’s Executive Director, Shamit is a Visiting Professor at King’s College, London and an Emeritus Professor at the University of Essex. He has 36 years of experience in international academia, government, business, regulation and philanthropy, is a former Senior Advisor to UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, and a Knowledge Exchange Fellow in the David Cameron administration. Shamit was previously Director of the UWA Public Policy Institute. He has held personal chairs, visiting professorships and senior management roles at Essex, Sussex, Liverpool and Queen Mary in the UK, and at UCLA, Yale and Toronto in North America. He has published six books, 70+ journal papers and book chapters, and 20+ policy reports. His research capture exceeds $70m research income.

John is Executive Director of the John Curtin Institute of Public Policy in addition to being ACSES’s Deputy Director. He has worked with ACSES since 2013 where he oversaw the Centre’s research grants program, and was Interim Director from August 2022 to July 2023. John has extensive senior level experience in the Western Australian Government, including as Chief of Staff to ministers and as director of intergovernmental relations in the Premier’s Department. He has researched and published on Australian public policy, politics, public administration and higher education, and is a regular media commentator on Australian and Western Australian politics and public policy. John has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of WA, a first class honours from Oxford University, and a Masters and PhD from the University of Sussex.

Ian is an applied economist with expertise in labour and health economics. He has a track record of research funding as chief investigator totalling AUD$7 million to-date from nationally competitive schemes including the NHMRC, NCVER and NCSEHE. Ian has published in the top journals in his field, including Social Science and Medicine, Higher Education and the Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management. He is a grant panel member for the MRFF and assessor for the ARC, co-editor of the Australian Journal of Labour Economics and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management.

Gemma has a Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Mathematics and a PhD in Genetic Epidemiology from the University of Western Australia. Gemma’s professional background includes roles in academia and government, with a primary focus in leveraging complex data to improve health and well-being outcomes. She has been awarded more than $3.5 million in research funding as Chief Investigator and has published over 50 peer-reviewed journal articles. Gemma’s work at the Centre provides her with an opportunity to apply her extensive health research background to improving student equity outcomes in higher education.

Associate Professor Tim Pitman is ACSES’s Trials and Evaluation Program Director. He was formerly a researcher of higher education policy with a focus on widening access and participation for groups of students historically under-represented in higher education. This included people from low-socioeconomic backgrounds, Indigenous people, people with disability, people from non-English speaking backgrounds and people from regional and remote parts of Australia. Tim is a former Senior Researcher and Equity Fellow with ACSES’s previous iteration NCSEHE. He has worked in the Australian higher education sector since 1996 and his PhD in Education was completed at The University of Western Australia in 2012.

Canki holds a Master of Finance and Double Degrees in International Business and Asian Studies from Curtin University. She has been working in the higher education sector for 13 years. Canki has been awarded twice as a professional staff member for the year for different areas. Her areas of expertise include project coordination, communication, and organisation. She is passionate about working with people from diverse backgrounds and understanding their cultures.

Anna holds a Bachelor of Arts in Media Studies from Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. She is a highly experienced Communications Specialist, having worked in various roles with a communications focus in New Zealand and Australia—from large public sector organisations to small private businesses. She has been a presenter for workshops on topics such as Plain Language for Business Writing and Use of Social Media for Marketing, and has run private marketing coaching sessions for small business owners. Throughout her career, Anna has shown a particular interest in making a difference to the lives of others in the roles she performed, which is what attracted her to the work of ACSES. Outside her corporate roles, Anna is a certified yoga and meditation instructor with a special interest in mindfulness and functional movement practices for physical and mental wellbeing.

Paul Koshy works in the Research and Policy Program examining issues relating to equity status and higher education participation and outcomes. His recent work has included research on parental expectations and higher education enrolment, and policy analysis on equity participation targets and the potential for equity rankings in Australian higher education.

Dr Patrick Broman has most recently been HEPPP Evaluation Manager at Swinburne University of Technology and was previously Lead Adviser, Network at the New Zealand Ministry of Education. He holds continuing appointments as Research Fellow at the Centre for Health and Social Practice, Waikato Institute of Technology (Hamilton, New Zealand) and the Centre for Just Places, Jesuit Social Services (Melbourne).

He is a demographer by training and applies strong quantitative and statistical modelling skills to his research and evaluation practice, much of which has involved regional disparities, especially in education; innovations in tertiary education and training; and the classification and counting of ethnic groups.

Novia holds a Master’s in Biostatistics from the University of Sydney and a PhD in Biomedical Science from Murdoch University. Her research background spans paediatric, maternal and infant health, as well as physiotherapy and exercise science, with a strong focus on advanced statistical modelling and data analysis. At ACSES, she applies her quantitative expertise to support equity-focused research and evidence-informed approaches to improving student outcomes in higher education.

Dr Gwyneth Peaty holds a BA in Communication Studies (First Class Honours) and a PhD in English from the University of Western Australia. She worked as a Lecturer in Internet Studies at Curtin University for several years and as a Research Fellow in the Centre for Culture and Technology (CCAT) in the School of Media, Creative Arts and Social Inquiry (MCASI). Gwyneth has collaborated with both Humanities and Health Sciences academics to create Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) for the edX platform, including all three of CurtinX’s “From Digital Technologies to Social Media” XSeries MOOCs.

Her research is interdisciplinary in nature and her publications cover a range of fields including popular culture, digital media and technology, film studies, horror, the Gothic, and disability studies. In 2022, Gwyneth won Curtin’s Humanities Early Career Researcher of the Year Award. Additional to her role as eLearning Designer at ACSES, she continues her work as a Senior Research Fellow at Curtin and is the Reviews Editor for The Australasian Journal of Popular Culture.

Jesse is an accomplished researcher and policy analyst with a passion for evidence-based practices and social mobility. He graduated with Honours in Economics and is currently pursuing a Master’s degree, focusing on evaluating the effectiveness of contemporary Australian programs aimed at combating human trafficking.

With extensive experience in public policy analysis, Jesse has conducted numerous randomised control trials to enhance community safety. He has worked with the Western Australia Police Force, the Department of Justice, and the Premier’s Priorities Unit, where he contributed to initiatives improving the State’s educational outcomes. Jesse has also presented at a number of criminology conferences and chaired sessions on crime prevention.

His work continues to focus on leveraging research to drive meaningful change, aiming to promote social mobility for vulnerable groups.

Andrew holds a Bachelor of Science in Physical Education & Biology and a Postgraduate Diploma in Business Data Analytics. He began his career as a secondary school teacher in Ireland before moving into analytics, including a role as a Data Analyst at a third-level institute that introduced him to equity-focused research in education. He later worked as a Data Analyst for a housing development company, authoring reports on housing markets in Ireland and supporting data-driven planning decisions. His commitment to improving equity in education drew him to ACSES, where his role represents a natural hybrid of his teaching and analytics experience, combining research, project management, and equity-focused work. Motivated by improving opportunities for all students, Andrew manages national projects and contributes to research that supports student success across the higher education sector.

David Raithel holds a Master of Astronomy and Astrophysics (Advanced) from the Australian National University and First Class Honours in Pure Mathematics from the University of Western Australia. His background spans pure mathematics, astrophysics, and applied machine learning. At the Australian Taxation Office, he led modelling projects in fraud detection and network risk analysis, integrating statistical rigour, explainable AI, and clear communication to support evidence-informed decision-making. He has a particular interest in unsupervised modelling—especially clustering and anomaly-detection techniques—and in how these methods can be engineered, validated, and deployed across varied data environments. He also provides data-science support to neuroscience research, using computer-vision models to analyse behavioural experiment data in sensory and perception studies.

Nurul is the Project Manager for the Western Australian Cooperative Outreach Project (WACOP) at ACSES. She leads cross-sector coordination and collaboration for this outreach initiative and convenes the WACOP Advisory Board, bringing university partners together to co-design a coordinated approach to outreach across Western Australia. She works with universities, schools, and communities to strengthen reach and effectiveness.

Her work is grounded in the belief that meaningful equality of opportunity is achieved through designing systems that respond to different starting points In practice, equity ensures that outreach is targeted, shaped by lived experience and responsive to context.

With over 20 years of professional experience, including extensive work in higher education, she has supported students across the full student lifecycle – from outreach and access through to transition, engagement, belonging, and success. During her time at Curtin University, she led, co-designed, and championed equity initiatives that strengthened participation and retention, including contributing to the development of a dedicated Indigenous student study space that supports culturally safe engagement and student success.

Nurul brings expertise in the design, coordination, and evaluation of complex, cross-institutional programs. Her work focuses on strengthening systems through mapping activity, identifying service gaps, and embedding evaluation and continuous improvement approaches that support evidence-informed decision-making.

Her approach is collaborative and grounded in co-design, bringing together stakeholder voice, data, and lived experience to translate complex systems into practical improvements.

Alongside her role at ACSES, she serves as Co-Lead for National Chapters within EPHEA’s Executive Leadership Group and as Western Australia Convener for the Equity Practitioners in Higher Education Association (EPHEA), contributing to national conversations on equity policy and practice in higher education.

Daniel Doss is a second-year Bachelor of Science (Actuarial Science) student at Curtin University. In his role as Data Analyst, Daniel brings his programming experience in R and Python to conduct various studies about student equity areas. His appointment through the Earn While You Learn program at Curtin has allowed him to combine his passion for students and education, as well as gain valuable professional experience while contributing to ACSES’s mission of promoting student equity. 

Isabel is a recent graduate from Curtin University where she received a Bachelor of Arts in Professional Writing and Publishing and specialised in English and Cultural Studies. She has previously worked as a social media manager for Banksia Journal, a Perth-based speculative fiction magazine, and C+Co The Artisan Collective, a collective store that supports local businesses. In 2024, she interned in the Marketing and Communications team at the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (UWRF). Throughout her internship she wrote and edited articles, blog posts, social media content and press releases for the Festival, as well as liaised with authors, journalists, and media representatives from around the world.

Vince is a Research Assistant at the Australian Centre for Student Equity and Success (ACSES). Previously, Vince was at the Department of Training and Workforce Development, where he contributed to data-driven workforce planning and policy. Vince received his First Class Honours degree in Economics from UWA, and has research interests in labour economics, education and applied econometrics.

Oliver is a Research Assistant at the Australian Centre for Student Equity and Success (ACSES). Oliver recently graduated with an Honours degree in Economics from UWA. His thesis examined public transport infrastructure and access to education in India. His research interests are in education economics, development Economics, applied microeconomics, and applied GIS.