Alice Rigney the first Aboriginal principal in Australia at Kaurna Plains, first urban Aboriginal school

Alice (Alitya) Rigney was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of South Australia for her education contribution at Kaurna Plains school.
Image courtesy Lester-Irabinna Rigney

Alice (Alitya) Rigney became Australia’s first Aboriginal school principal in 1986, heading the nation’s first urban Aboriginal school, Kaurna Plains, in Adelaide's northern suburbs.

Born at Point Pearce on Yorke Peninsula, Dr Rigney was an elder and matriarch of the Kaurna and Narungga Aboriginal nations of South Australia. When Rigney completed primary school, her teacher negotiated for her to attend Unley Girls Technical High School in Adelaide as the local high schools wouldn’t accept Aboriginal children.

Rigney returned to Point Pearce after her schooling and trained as a nurse, married, and raised her family.  She worked at the local kindergarten, then as school support officer at Maitland Area School. She was eventually registered as a teacher but only for Point Pearce. She went to Adelaide as the sole Aboriginal student of 400 at the de Lissa Institute teachers college, now part of the University of South Australia.

Rigney graduated to teach at a primary school in Adelaide's western suburbs before becoming the first Aboriginal bureaucrat in South Australia’s education department. In the 1980s, she agitated for what became Kura Yerlo Aboriginal Centre in Largs Bay and Kaurna Plains School in Elizabeth,

With Rigney as first principal, Kaurna Plains aimed to give Aboriginal children an academically-focused curriculum respecting Aboriginal culture. It responded to "widespread educational disadvantage identified within the Northern Adelaide region resulting in Aboriginal learners not meeting national and state educational benchmarks”. While teaching 5000 students passing through the school, Rigney introduced the Kaurna language curriculum in South Australia.

Rigney’s many honours included a public service medal for her outstanding contribution to education and an honorary doctorate from the University of South Australia.

Rigney died in 2017, a day after her husband, Lester, was buried on their birth country at Point Pearce. Their three children all took roles in education: Lester-Irabinna Rigney as a Professor of Education at UniSA; Eileen Wanganeen as teacher and education leader and Tracey Ritchie as a principal Aboriginal consultant at the education and child development department.