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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2017-05-30 Daily Xml
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Rigney, Dr Alice

The Hon. S.E. CLOSE (Port Adelaide—Minister for Education and Child Development, Minister for Higher Education and Skills) (14:11): I seek leave to make a ministerial statement.

Leave granted.

The Hon. S.E. CLOSE: I wish to pay tribute to Dr Alice (Alitya) Rigney PSM, who passed away recently. The family of Dr Rigney have been kind enough to give me permission to use her name in public. Dr Rigney, also known as Aunty Alice by many, dedicated her life to education, was a strong advocate for Aboriginal people and believed in bringing all people together as part of a journey towards reconciliation.

Dr Rigney was a Kaurna and Narungga elder from Bukkiyana on the Yorke Peninsula. After pursuing a career in nursing, marrying Lester Rigney, who unfortunately also passed away recently, and having her first child, Dr Rigney pursued her interest in education. She worked in kindergartens and schools before receiving her teaching qualification and being appointed to a mainstream primary school. A pioneer educator who paved the path for others to follow, Dr Rigney became the first female Aboriginal principal in Australia, was one of the first Aboriginal people to work for the education department and became principal of Kaurna Plains School in 1986.

Dr Rigney also had an immense dedication and passion for the revival of the Kaurna language and worked together with other Kaurna people, teachers and linguists to reawaken the Kaurna language. She was instrumental in including the Narungga and Kaurna language into South Australian schools. She travelled to Germany to see letters in the Kaurna language that had been written by Kaurna children in the early days of European settlement. The letters were originally sent to Germany by missionaries who had been teaching the children in the 1840s at Pirltawardli (the 'possum house'), an Aboriginal school on the banks of the River Torrens.

In total, we estimate that Dr Rigney taught over 5,000 Aboriginal students in her lifetime. In recognition, she was awarded an Australia Day Public Service Medal for services to Aboriginal education in 1991. In addition, Dr Rigney, who was a graduate of the University of South Australia's De Lissa Institute, was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of South Australia, in 1998; a Gladys Elphick Lifetime Award for outstanding contribution to education, in 2011; a Unesco Adelaide Chapter award for outstanding leadership in education, in 2013; and a Zonta Outstanding Women of Achievement Award for education, in 2017.

In 2006, Dr Rigney was made an ambassador for the commonwealth Department of Education Science and Training's National Indigenous English Literacy and Numeracy Strategy. In Dr Rigney's words:

The teaching of children is our single greatest story of hope for a reconciled Australia.

My condolences and thoughts are with Dr Rigney's children, Eileen, Irabinna and Tracey. A memorial service to celebrate her life will take place at 2 o'clock on Wednesday 7 June 2017 at the University of Adelaide, Bonython Hall, North Terrace.

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