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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-06-16 Daily Xml
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Grantskalns, Ms C.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta) (15:26): I would like to share with the house the sombre but also in some ways celebratory news that Carolyn Grantskalns, the Chief Executive Officer of the Association of Independent Schools in South Australia, is retiring come the end of the year—potentially, early next year. Her retirement has been announced in the last 24 hours, and it is appropriate to place on the record the outstanding career of service she has had to education, particularly supporting the educational needs and opportunities for young South Australians over a lifetime of service.

Carolyn Grantskalns began her teaching career in public education as an English teacher and history teacher; an outstanding communicator then and now and an innovative leader in particular with a developed expertise in understanding the needs and opportunities for junior, secondary and middle-school students. The opportunities for the development of a child's potential through those middle-school years is something she became a national leader on. She moved from the public sector to the Independent sector in the late 1980s, I believe 1988, and in 1990 she was appointed to the very prestigious and highly sought-after role of Principal of Wilderness School—a position she held for 16 years, until 2006.

She was a national leader in girls' education, recognised as such right around Australia, and in the professional development of staff—something that is absolutely taken for granted. Its importance is completely understood everywhere now, but in the 1990s the professional development of Carolyn's staff identified the understanding that she had of its primary importance in the delivery of a quality education at the school that she led. She was also a very effective recruiter of staff for the benefit of her school and the girls at Wilderness.

During the time that she was at Wilderness, she was variously chair of the Industrial Relations Committee of AISSA, the president of AISSA and a member of a number of boards: the tertiary residential college, St Ann's, the Teachers Credit Union (then known as SATISFAC) and the National Council of Independent Schools of Australia.

In 2006, she was appointed Principal of Lowther Hall Anglican Grammar School in Essendon, Victoria. In addition to that role, she also held positions of chair of the Victorian branch of the Association of Heads of Independent Schools of Australia and membership of the AHISA board, treasurer of Girls Sport Victoria and board member of the Centre for Strategic Education. She then came back to South Australia, for which we are all very grateful.

In 2013, she became the Chief Executive of the Association of Independent Schools, a role she has held for the last decade and will hold until her replacement takes over, likely early next year. In that role, she has developed an extraordinary reputation for the support she has been able to give to principals and schools, the way that she has supported strengthening of the governance within schools, the support she has provided to quite a number now—an increasingly growing number—of new independent schools that have been able to establish with advice and support from Carolyn and the team at AHISA.

She has provided support to the broader South Australian educational symptom through a range of ways: a participant in the sector heads, which meet regularly, certainly during my time as minister; and looking to advance educational sector outcomes for all students. In that role, I particularly want to pay tribute to the work she did during the coronavirus pandemic, when around Australia education was in so many ways utterly chaotic in 2020 and 2021.

South Australia alone kept schools open not only in the public sector but also in all other sectors, and Carolyn's role was ensuring that the independent sector, along with Neil McGoran and Catholic Ed and Rick Persse in the education department, was singing from the same song sheet. That removed the risk of mixed messages to parents, students and staff, and that was tremendously important.

She also serves Australia through the Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority Board. She is the deputy chair of the Education Standards Board. She has served on the Teachers Registration Board and so many other boards. She is a Fellow of the Australian Council for Educational Leaders and, perhaps most importantly of all, she is a devoted fan of the Norwood Football Club, the Redlegs. I think that everyone in the chamber at the moment would thoroughly endorse that sentiment.

S.E. Andrews interjecting:

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Nearly everyone. Carolyn has led an outstanding career of service to education, to children and young people, to families and to schools and staff around South Australia. We wish her well in retirement. I know her family will be glad of her more. I know that she will find many further ways to contribute to education in South Australia in the years ahead.

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