Jesse Martin

Early Career Outstanding Alumni, College of Arts, Society and Education

In 2014, Jesse graduated with a Bachelor of Arts majoring in History, Politics, and International Relations. He has since founded The Streets Movement (TSM) and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander International Engagement Organisation (ATSIIEO) to help empower Indigenous communities and work to ensure they can meet their own social impact needs.

Growing up in Bentley Park, Jesse was inspired to drive change after witnessing his friends and fellow community members struggle with destructive patterns of behaviour.

It was these experiences that drove 20 year-old Jesse to create The Streets Movement Organisation whose mission was to create opportunities for young Indigenous people through education, pathways and empowerment.

Since its inception in 2007, The Streets Movement has run mentoring and boxing programs in almost every Cairns high school. The program extended into prisons and detention centres, providing men with a comfortable environment to yarn about their mental health challenges.

In 2013, The Streets Movement became the first grassroots Aboriginal organisation in Queensland to be invited to attend a United Nations (UN) Forum in New York.

Next, The Streets Movement partnered with universities across the globe to set up the Mulumulung International Experience, or the MI-Experience, offering Indigenous students from remote and regional areas the opportunity to build real-world relationships and experience some of the top world-wide educational institutions.

With the purpose of fostering Indigenous partnerships and connections internationally, Jesse then founded the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander International Engagement Organisation. Jesse started ATSIIEO to ensure the interests, values, culture and identity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are portrayed to the international community through an undiluted First Nations lens.