Equity and Excellence in Education

Finalists

Anna Mirasgentis, Principal
Woodville High School
Kaurna Country

Creating a culture where every student is seen, heard and valued

As Principal of Woodville High School, Anna Mirasgentis has created a culture where every student is seen, heard and valued. Through unique student leadership structures, students actively contribute to decisions about learning, wellbeing and school improvement, while targeted programs create culturally responsive support for Aboriginal learners.

Anna's commitment to equity extends across 96 cultural communities, with students, staff and families contributing to the school's direction through authentic co-design. Her leadership has contributed to stronger wellbeing results, increased student leadership and measurable academic gains across NAPLAN, PAT and SACE outcomes.

Claire Higgs, Lead Preschool Teacher
Koonibba Preschool
Wirangu Country

Creating learning that reflects children, culture and community

As a leader at Koonibba Preschool, Claire Higgs has transformed learning by recognising Aboriginal children as capable learners and building curriculum from their strengths, voices, identities and family knowledge. Children’s words, stories, questions and ways of communicating become starting points for inquiry, shifting curriculum from learning designed for children to learning created with them.

Through deep listening and genuine partnerships with families and community, Claire has strengthened agency, belonging and high expectations. Attendance increased from 58% in 2025 to 83% in 2026, reflecting stronger engagement, trust and shared ownership of children’s learning.

Peace Library
Thebarton Senior College
Kaurna Country

Building understanding through the power of storytelling

The Peace Library at Thebarton Senior College empowers students to become educators through authentic storytelling. Inspired by the Human Library concept, the initiative enables students from refugee, migrant and diverse cultural backgrounds to become ‘living books’. The program has built learners’ agency, confidence and communication while challenging stereotypes.

Over the past three years, more than 215 students have participated and engaged more than 865 primary school students in conversations about migration, identity and belonging. By listening deeply and learning from different perspectives, the Peace Library builds empathy, strengthens community connections and helps create more inclusive and compassionate communities.

Innovation in Teaching and Learning

Finalists

Bird Legends: Heroes of the Limestone Coast
Kangaroo Inn Area School
Boandik Country

Transforming inquiry into authentic learning with real-world impact

Bird Legends: Heroes of the Limestone Coast connects students with their local environment through inquiry, fieldwork and real-world problem solving. Working alongside rangers, environmental organisations, designers and local businesses, students investigated bird habitats before creating professional-quality trading cards, websites and community displays.

The impact extended beyond the final products: 100% of students developed a stronger understanding of birds and their habitats, 89% reported growth in creativity and 78% in communication. Students presented their work to more than 200 educators and experts, demonstrating the power of authentic audiences to build knowledge, confidence and ownership of learning.

Empowering Change: Innovative Collaborative Teaching
Peterborough High School
Ngadjuri Country

Reimagining teaching through collaboration and shared ownership

In response to significant staffing challenges and complex student needs, Peterborough High School reimagined teaching through a collaborative block learning and co-teaching model. Co-designed with students and staff, the approach allows students to focus deeply on two subjects at a time while accessing real-time learning and wellbeing support.

Daily Sunshine Gatherings, community mentors and dedicated collaborative planning enable staff, including SSOs, to continually adapt teaching around student needs. The model has delivered measurable improvements in student engagement, wellbeing, satisfaction and behaviour, creating a more connected learning environment while establishing new ways of working for staff across the school.

Prospect North TV – Sammy Leverenz
Prospect North Primary School
Kaurna Country

Empowering students through authentic digital storytelling

Prospect North TV empowers students to become communicators, creators and leaders through authentic digital media production. Guided by SSO Sammy Leverenz, students take responsibility for planning, scripting, interviewing, filming and editing content for public audiences. The program develops digital literacy and oracy through real-world experience.

The approach has led to significant growth in confidence, communication and critical thinking, while peer mentoring transfers skills across year levels and supports the program's sustainability. Student-led Agency Conferences extend the impact beyond broadcasting, enabling young people to share their skills and experiences with other students. Positioning them as creators, mentors and leaders of learning.

Excellence in Learner Agency

Finalists

Amy Watson, Preschool Director
Largs North Kindergarten
Kaurna Country

Empowering children as capable learners

As Director at Largs North Kindergarten, Amy Watson has embedded a culture where children see themselves as capable drivers of their own learning. Children co-develop the kindergarten's Child Philosophy and actively shape personalised learning plans, identifying their learning styles, sensory preferences, regulation needs and individual goals.

Through daily meetings, child-led inquiry and shared decision-making, children influence their learning environment and experiences while developing confidence, independence and responsibility. Amy's approach extends beyond the kindergarten through transition partnerships, communities of practice and statewide professional learning, supporting other educators to embed learner agency from the earliest years of education.

Big Questions, Bright Futures: Where Learners Lead the Way
Stansbury Primary School
Narungga Country

Empowering children to lead their own learning through curiosity and inquiry

Big Questions, Bright Futures places children's curiosity and thinking at the centre of learning at Stansbury Primary School. Community walks spark children's wonderings, which become sustained inquiries as learners observe, question, develop theories and determine where their learning leads.

Pedagogical documentation makes children's thinking visible, enabling learners to revisit, refine and deepen their ideas over time. This approach has transformed practice across the school, with educators shifting from directing learning to listening, waiting and following children's thinking. Stansbury's approach is now being shared with other school leaders and educators, demonstrating what becomes possible when children are genuinely trusted to lead learning.

Highways Program
Charles Campbell College
Kaurna Country

Empowering autistic students to shape their future pathways

The Highways Program at Charles Campbell College empowers autistic students to shape their identity, learning and future pathways through experiences co-designed around their strengths and aspirations. Students choose to participate and learn alongside autistic adults. Feedback continually shapes future activities. Participants collaboratively named the program ‘Highways’ and worked to personalise the SA Autism Inclusion Charter.

The impact is deeply personal, students report greater confidence discussing autism and seeking support, increased independence and community participation. Along with reduced isolation and greater clarity about employment and future pathways. The model is now expanding through a statewide Autism Pathways Network, extending student-led, strengths-based pathway planning to schools across South Australia.

Inclusive Practices in Education

Finalists

All In: Inclusion as Identity
Long Street Primary School
Barngarla Country

Embedding inclusion into every learner's experience

Long Street Primary School has made inclusion part of its whole-school identity, ensuring every learner is known, valued and supported to succeed. Through a multi-tiered system of supports, students receive timely, personalised support while remaining connected to high-quality classroom learning.

The number of reception students identified with oral language concerns reduced from 36% to 8% within 6 months. 80% of students receiving tier 3 phonemic awareness intervention returned to tier 1 or progressed to tier 2 phonics. The school's model is now informing inclusive practice across South Australia.

Inclusive Education Team
Highbury Primary School and Disability Unit
Kaurna Country

Creating a school where every learner belongs

Highbury Primary School's Inclusive Education Team has built a whole-school model where learners in specialist settings participate fully in school life. Since establishing its first specialist class in 2021, the school has expanded to support 44 learners across five settings, while ensuring access to camps, excursions, leadership roles and whole-school experiences alongside peers.

Inclusion also flows into specialist settings through buddy classes and student leadership, building connection across the school. Attendance has increased significantly, families report greater confidence and participation beyond school, and Highbury now shares its systems and practice with schools establishing or expanding specialist settings.

Kidman Park Primary School and Disability Unit
Kaurna Country

Creating a culture where inclusion is everyone's responsibility

Kidman Park Primary School and Disability Unit has embedded inclusion across mainstream and specialist settings, ensuring every learner can access, participate and belong. Neuro-affirming practice, disability awareness education, joint learning and the Helper Licence program equip students to build respectful relationships across the school. The playground communication board enables non-speaking students to communicate with peers.

Regulation spaces and daily wellbeing check-ins remove barriers to learning, with Kidman Park exceeding the state average across every wellbeing and engagement measure in 2025. Its practices are now shared with schools across portfolios, strengthening inclusive education beyond the site.

Community Impact Award

Finalists

Books in Homes program
Julian Mattay, Mount Gambier Public Library and Melaleuca Park Kindergarten
Boandik Country

Connecting families through the power of books and reading

Through the Books in Homes program, local community supporter Julian Mattay and Mount Gambier Public Library are working alongside Melaleuca Park Kindergarten to strengthen early literacy and equitable access to books. Julian's ongoing financial support provides participating children with nine high-quality books each year, while the library brings literacy expertise and connections to broader community resources. The educator team uses these books to facilitate family connection sessions, modelling different ways to read and enjoy the books together.

Together, these contributions are building families' confidence to establish reading routines at home. Children are demonstrating greater interest in books, more descriptive language and stronger connections with stories, while families are increasingly engaged as partners in their children's learning.

Meldanda Environmental Education
Mid Murray Landcare and Cambrai Primary School and Preschool
Peramangk Country

Growing environmental leaders through community partnership

For more than a decade, Mid Murray Landcare has worked alongside Cambrai Primary School and Preschool to transform Meldanda, a 100-acre environmental education centre, into a living classroom. By connecting students with scientists, conservationists, volunteers and environmental expertise, Mid Murray Landcare enables young people to contribute to genuine conservation through habitat restoration, threatened species protection, seed banking and environmental monitoring.

The partnership has helped to develop students from participants into environmental leaders, with young people developing specialist knowledge and presenting alongside professionals at state and national Landcare conferences. Meldanda demonstrates how sustained community expertise can enrich public education while empowering students to create meaningful environmental change.

Aunty Josie Agius Award

Finalists

Aboriginal Education Team
Hallett Cove School
Kaurna Country

Embedding Aboriginal perspectives through whole-school leadership

The Hallett Cove School Aboriginal Education Team has shifted Aboriginal education from individual initiatives to a whole-school improvement strategy, placing Aboriginal learners, culture and community at the centre of educational excellence. Aboriginal student data informs targeted support across attendance, achievement, wellbeing and engagement, while weekly Marni Kanthi Learning strengthens identity, culture and leadership.

Aboriginal students are increasingly visible as school leaders, including Aboriginal school captains in both 2025 and 2026. More than 160 staff also participate in professional learning, embedding culturally responsive practice and Aboriginal ways of knowing, being and doing across curriculum and school life.

Aboriginal Voice Framework
Aboriginal Education Policy Team
Kaurna Country

Embedding Aboriginal voice in policy, practice and decision-making

The Aboriginal Education Policy Team is embedding Aboriginal voice into how the department develops policy and projects through the Aboriginal Voice Framework. Led by Jodie Coleman and supported by Chris Coxon, the Framework creates a formal process for Aboriginal knowledge, expertise and lived experience to inform decisions from planning through to evaluation.

Co-designed training, delivered with Tauondi Aboriginal Corporation, builds employees' cultural capability to engage respectfully and meaningfully. Since 2023, more than 350 staff have completed training and the Aboriginal Voice Register has supported more than 210 engagement processes, creating lasting system change through Aboriginal voice and leadership.

Emmalene Richards, Barngarla Language Curriculum Writer
Port Lincoln Education Office
Barngarla Country

Revitalising language, culture and connection to Country

Proud Barngarla woman Emmalene Richards is strengthening cultural identity and self-determination by revitalising Barngarla language across education. As Barngarla Language Curriculum Writer at the Port Lincoln Education Office, Emmalene works with schools and preschools to embed local language, stories, art and on-Country learning, ensuring children experience Aboriginal knowledge grounded in the Country where they live and learn.

Her cultural conversations also create safe spaces for educators to explore racism, history and cultural protocols, building confidence to move from awareness to meaningful action. Emmalene's influence now extends across education networks, community organisations and future Barngarla language learning initiatives throughout the Eyre Peninsula.

Outstanding Early Career Professionals

Finalists

Georgia McLeod, Teacher
Memorial Oval Primary School
Barngarla Country

Turning innovation into everyday improvement

Georgia McLeod has quickly emerged as a leader at Memorial Oval Primary School, taking on an Acting Deputy Principal role within her first 4 years of teaching while continuing to build expertise and share solutions across the school. Drawing on her knowledge of literacy assessment, Georgia developed EdChat tools that turn complex DIBELS and writing data into precise, classroom-ready teaching responses now used across the primary years.

In her own Year 6 cohort, students reading on track or above doubled from 6 to 12, while those in the intensive range fell from 7 to 3. Georgia's work demonstrates how emerging leadership, innovation and evidence-informed practice can accelerate whole-school improvement.

Sean (Xuan) Sun, Preschool Teacher
Lantana Kindergarten
Kaurna Country

Building global connections through early learning

As Preschool Teacher at Lantana Kindergarten, Sean Sun has reimagined intercultural learning by creating a sustained partnership between children in Adelaide and Qingdao, China. Rather than learning about another culture, children learn with one another through conversation, inquiry, storytelling, art and digital collaboration, developing genuine relationships, identity and global citizenship.

The work has expanded beyond the kindergarten through the international Wind Over the Bridge exhibition, showcasing children's learning in China, Italy and Adelaide. Sean also shares the approach with educators across the sector, demonstrating how an early career teacher can create authentic global learning while keeping children's voices and curiosity at its centre.

Shaun Miller, Primary Aboriginal Education Coordinator
Ceduna Area School
Wirangu (Far West Coast People) Country

Empowering Aboriginal learners through voice and partnership

As Primary Aboriginal Education Coordinator at Ceduna Area School, Shaun Miller is strengthening outcomes for Aboriginal learners by making student voice, family partnership and cultural identity central to school improvement. In his fifth year of teaching, Shaun monitors attendance closely, seeks learners' perspectives on barriers and works alongside families, educators and community organisations to respond early.

Family participation has increased, chronic absenteeism is declining and Aboriginal learners are more connected to classrooms. Shaun's influence now extends across schools and preschools, where Aboriginal learner voice is informing strategic discussions about cultural safety, belonging and the conditions young people need to thrive.

Excellence in Collaborative Partnerships

Finalists

Growing Teaching Talent in Whyalla
Whyalla/Port Augusta 2 Portfolio and Schools, People and Culture Division and Adelaide University
Barngarla and Kaurna Country

Growing local teachers for regional communities

Growing Teaching Talent in Whyalla is tackling regional teacher shortages by recognising that future teachers may already be working within local education settings. Schools, preschools, Adelaide University, the Local Education Team and People and Culture have created employment-based pathways enabling School Services Officers and early childhood educators to gain teaching qualifications while remaining employed.

Flexible degree delivery, release time and financial support remove barriers that can make university study inaccessible in regional communities. The partnership is now supporting 30 educators across seven schools, growing a skilled local teaching workforce while strengthening the long-term sustainability of public education in Whyalla.

Hybrid Learning: Stronger Pathways, Stronger Communities
Port Lincoln 1 Portfolio and Port Lincoln 2 Portfolio
Barngarla and Wirangu Country

Removing barriers through shared learning

The Eyre Peninsula Secondary Alliance has transformed secondary education by creating a sustainable hybrid learning model that ensures where students live no longer determines the opportunities available to them. Through local delivery, every secondary school across Eyre Peninsula works together to provide access to specialist senior subjects, shared teacher expertise and high-quality pathways.

Today, more than 90 students from 14 schools access 21 subjects through contemporary hybrid learning, enabling young people to pursue aspirations ranging from medicine to engineering, while remaining connected to their local communities and strengthening the future regional workforce.

The Learning Centre
Urrbrae Agricultural High School
Kaurna Country

Bringing agriculture to life through authentic partnerships

The Learning Centre is a longstanding partnership between Urrbrae Agricultural High School, the Royal Agricultural and Horticultural Society of South Australia and the Department for Education. It combines education and industry expertise to deliver one of the Royal Adelaide Show's largest agricultural learning experiences.

Each year, around 200,000 visitors engage with agriculture, food and fibre, sustainability and primary industries, while more than 200 Urrbrae students become educators, mentors and ambassadors. Supported by a formal partnership through to 2031, the Learning Centre demonstrates how sustained collaboration can create authentic learning, build student leadership and strengthen agricultural literacy across the South Australian community.

Outstanding Safety Initiatives

Finalists

Elizabeth Grove Primary School
Kaurna Country

Creating safe conditions for staff and students to thrive

Elizabeth Grove Primary School has created supportive working conditions for staff navigating the demands of educating children and supporting families experiencing complex circumstances. A clear 5-year direction, consistent whole-school practices and responsive workload management provide stability, reduce preventable pressures and help staff focus on their core work.

Connected leadership, peer learning and coaching strengthen capability, while wrap-around support means complex family circumstances are managed collectively rather than falling to individual teachers. Staff are encouraged to raise concerns and seek support early, creating an environment where people feel supported to manage complexity, grow professionally and provide safe, consistent learning experiences for students.

Vale Park Primary School
Kaurna Country

Building psychological safety through collective responsibility

Vale Park Primary School has taken a deliberate approach to psychosocial safety by examining and redesigning the organisational conditions affecting staff. Rather than adding standalone wellbeing initiatives, the school reviewed workload, meeting structures, student behaviour responses, professional expectations and the ways staff work together.

A sequenced 2-year approach has clarified priorities, strengthened consistent behaviour and regulation responses and established shared expectations through the Vale Park Educator statement. Healthy boundaries, integrity, collaboration and contribution are now part of a common professional framework. By addressing psychosocial risks through the design of work itself, Vale Park is creating safer, more predictable and sustainable conditions for staff and students.

WHS Management System
Hallett Cove School
Kaurna Country

Transforming workplace safety through digital innovation

Hallett Cove School has transformed workplace safety through a purpose-built WHS Management System developed in-house by Assistant Principal John Sellar. Replacing fragmented processes with a single source of truth, the system manages training, qualifications, chemicals, machinery, risk assessments, onboarding, excursions and student competency across the school.

Supporting approximately 160 staff, automated compliance checks and competency gates prevent staff or students from accessing specialist equipment without verified training. Designed collaboratively around real workplace needs, the system has reduced administrative burden, strengthened individual accountability and created consistent safety practices across learning areas, demonstrating how digital innovation can make proactive safety easier to understand, maintain and act on.

Excellence in Collective Wellbeing

Finalists

Cultural Leaders Group
Elizabeth Vale Primary School, Preschool and Intensive English
Kaurna Country

Strengthening wellbeing through cultural leadership

The Cultural Leaders Group at Elizabeth Vale Primary School, Preschool and Intensive English has strengthened collective wellbeing by ensuring cultural diversity actively shapes school life. Established in 2021, the group brings together staff from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds to advise leadership, build staff capability and strengthen connections with families.

More than 35 languages are spoken across the community and 62% of students come from an English as an additional language or dialect background. The group has strengthened cultural safety, staff voice and students' pride in identity. Families report feeling safe and supported, reflecting a culture where diversity is recognised as a strength and wellbeing is everyone's responsibility.

Enhancing Persistence and Perseverance through Regulation
Oakbank School
Kaurna and Peramangk Country

Building resilient learners through whole-school regulation

Oakbank School has embedded self-regulation across Reception to Year 12 so every student and staff member shares a common language and strategies for wellbeing and learning. Personalised regulation plans, explicit teaching and inclusive spaces ensure support is available to everyone, reducing stigma while building persistence, perseverance and independence.

Since implementation, sensory room visits have reduced by 31%, supported learning referrals by 47%, suspensions by 50% and exclusions by 46%. Attendance has increased from 82% to more than 87%, alongside growth in emotional regulation and literacy. The model is now being shared with schools and preschools across South Australia.

Positive Behaviour for Learning Initiative
Support and Inclusion Reform Directorate
Kaurna Country

Strengthening wellbeing through consistent whole-school practice

The Positive Behaviour for Learning initiative is supporting schools to replace reactive behaviour responses with consistent, preventative and evidence-informed whole-school practice. Since the pilot began in 2023, the department-based team has supported 39 regional and metropolitan schools, with further expansion underway.

Participating sites are reporting substantial improvements in safety, belonging and staff confidence. Salisbury North Primary School reduced average weekly suspensions from 5.5 to 1.5, while Golden Grove High School recorded a 59% reduction in external suspensions and 350% increase in positive recognition. By building staff capability and shared practice, PBL is strengthening collective wellbeing across schools and the system.

Outstanding Reconciliation Initiatives

Finalists

Bush Tucker Garden – Collective commitment to reconciliation
Flinders View Primary School
Barngarla Country

Growing reconciliation through Country, culture and community

The Bush Tucker Garden at Flinders View Primary School has become a living expression of reconciliation, co-designed over 5 years with Aboriginal staff, families, Elders and community. Through cultural learning, yarning, cooking, language and Caring for Country, students and families learn together while Aboriginal knowledge is embedded across curriculum and school life.

The initiative has strengthened student engagement, cultural pride, family participation and Aboriginal representation in school decision-making. The garden now connects classroom learning, student leadership and community programs, creating a shared space where relationships grow and Aboriginal culture is not simply acknowledged, but understood, valued and lived.

One River, Many Stories: A Community-Led Model of Living Reconciliation
Riverdale Primary School
Kaurna Country

Bringing reconciliation to life through learning, culture and community

One River, Many Stories embeds reconciliation across Riverdale Primary School through sustained learning that culminates in the community-led Rec by the River celebration. Every year level explores Aboriginal histories, cultures, Country and local stories before students share their learning through culturally meaningful products, performances and community experiences.

Now in its third year, Rec by the River brings together more than 300 community members annually, alongside Aboriginal artists, families, organisations and services. The initiative has repositioned the school as a community hub where learning, culture and support intersect, making reconciliation visible, active and embedded across curriculum and community life.

The Culturally Responsive Framework
Workforce Strategy
Kaurna Country

Embedding cultural responsiveness across South Australia's education workforce

The Culturally Responsive Framework establishes cultural responsiveness as a responsibility for every Department for Education employee. Developed with Aboriginal voices and expertise, it defines the knowledge, behaviours and actions needed to create culturally safe workplaces where Aboriginal employees, children, young people, families and communities are valued and can thrive.

Designed for a workforce of more than 30,000 employees, the framework embeds cultural responsiveness across leadership, teaching and learning, policy and accountability. Supported by professional learning and Aboriginal-led partnerships, it shifts reconciliation from aspiration to everyday practice and provides a shared foundation for sustained, system-wide cultural change.

Excellence in Leadership

Finalists

Craig Akehurst, Principal
Port Lincoln High School
Barngarla Country

Excellence in building a culture of belonging

As Principal of Port Lincoln High School, Craig Akehurst has led significant cultural change by placing belonging, wellbeing and high expectations at the centre of school improvement. Through CREW and the Wellbeing Hub, he has replaced reactive approaches with proactive, relationship-based structures that strengthen learner agency, resilience and connection.

Wellbeing data shows increased school belonging and stronger connections with important adults, alongside improved Year 9 NAPLAN writing. Craig also invests deeply in staff leadership through coaching, mentoring and professional learning. Schools across South Australia now visit Port Lincoln to learn from its approach, extending his influence well beyond the site.

Maddie McArthur, Deputy Principal
Long Street Primary School
Barngarla Country

Leading a statewide shift in learning

As Deputy Principal at Long Street Primary School, Maddie McArthur has led a whole-school shift in how students understand themselves as learners. Recognising the impact of disadvantage, disability and trauma, she developed an approach that explicitly builds learner dispositions alongside knowledge and academic achievement.

Maddie has embedded this work across curriculum, assessment, reporting and daily practice by developing staff capability and empowering students to reflect on their own growth. Her leadership now influences educators beyond Long Street through department exploration projects, statewide networks and national presentations, demonstrating how adaptive, relational leadership can translate complex reform into sustainable improvement for learners and educators.

Margaret Roads, Principal
Ardrossan Area School
Narungga Country

Leading regional excellence through inclusion and innovation

As Principal of Ardrossan Area School, Margaret Roads has spent eight years building a culture where regional location does not limit opportunity. Her leadership of The Lighthouse created personalised local support for students with disability and additional learning needs who might otherwise travel more than 90 minutes each day to access specialist provision.

Margaret has also expanded digital learning, curriculum opportunity and industry connections while empowering staff through shared leadership and evidence-informed improvement. As a founding member of the Yorke Peninsula Secondary Alliance, she influences regional and statewide practice, advocating for equity and demonstrating what high-quality public education can look like in country communities.