Ask Me Anything Panel: Healthy Ecosystems

As part of Sustainability Week, we invite you to join our Ask Me Anything panel — an open and inclusive forum designed to spark meaningful dialogue around pressing sustainability issues.

This session will be centred around Healthy Ecosystems and brings together a diverse group of experts and practitioners working across this sector at the University.

Anyone is welcome as this is your opportunity to ask questions, share ideas, and gain insights from those driving change across the sector.

Meet the panellists:

Sam Russell, Founder of Urban Guerrillas

Sam Russell’s career propelled in the past 4 years, completing his Bachelors of Environmental Science: Conservation and Wildlife Biology part time. Working part time in ecological restoration, while also starting his own Not-For-Profit. Sam’s initiative to start his own youth focused environmental organisation came from a necessity to connect the younger general public with academics (Universities and Tafes) and Friends of groups to better educate them on the importance of the environment. Through this act of connecting and educating, he found that larger restoration projects could occur. Since late 2022 Urban Guerrillas has held over 50 events, helped to plant 25,000 Indigenous plants, attracted over 1,600 attendees to its plantings, workshops, working bees, and fundraisers and put in some 13,000 volunteer hours.

Dr Kylie Soanes, Research Fellow in Urban Biodiversity, The University of Melbourne

Dr. Kylie Soanes is an urban ecologist and conservation scientist at the University of Melbourne. She leads the Urban Biodiversity Research Cluster within the Melbourne Centre for Cities, which aims to increase our understanding of the nature of urban biodiversity, the threats faced, and the capacity for conservation action. A leading expert in her field, she collaborates with councils, community groups, engineers and architects to make real change for wildlife in urban environments. Her projects include building rope bridges to help gliding possums cross roads, 3D-printing nesting hollows for powerful owls, and adding floating wetlands to busy city rivers. A passionate and skilled communicator, Kylie regularly shares her research with policy makers, practitioners and the broader public. She has published popular science articles in The Guardian, The Conversation and Australian Geographic, and is a regular guest on ABC Radio National. Her expertise in science communication has been recognised through awards from the Royal Society of Victoria and Science and Technology Australia’s ‘Superstars of STEM’ program.

Professor Brendan Wintle, Director of the Melbourne Biodiversity Institute, The University of Melbourne

Professor Brendan Wintle develops economic-ecological methods to support biodiversity conservation decisions and policy. He has been Director of Australia’s Threatened Species Recovery Research Hub, theme leader of the Centre of Excellence for Environmental Decisions, and UN IPBES coordinating lead author. He is founder and lead councillor on Australia’s Biodiversity Council, serves on the Zoos Victoria Board and elected fellow of the Royal Society of Victoria.

Rachael Miller, Sustainability Coordinator (Biodiversity & Water), The University of Melbourne

Rachael is responsible for ensuring the University meets its Healthy Ecosystem targets in the Sustainability Plan 2030 and is co-founder and co-chair of the ACTS Biodiversity Working Group which is aiming to accelerate the sectors efforts to combat the biodiversity crisis.

Participating in Green Impact? Complete these toolkit actions by attending (teams/individuals):

Sustainability Week 2025: You have attended an event as part of Sustainability Week (30 points!)
Explore the actions under the 'Biodiversity' theme filter
UOM051 & S008/UOM-I77: The purchases you make, have been ethically procured
UOM016/UOM-I08: You have attended an event run by the Sustainability Team
UOM011 & S019/UOM-I02 & UOM-I03: You have shared your involvement in Sustainability Week via social media and/or interacted with one of the Sustainability Delivery Team's communication channels
UOM018/UOM-I07: You have written an article for the Green Impact newsletter based on your participation in Sustainability Week.