Adelaide Thinkers in Residence public lecture / AW Jones Oration

Early Child Development: The building blocks for successful societies

With Dr Fraser Mustard

Monday 19 March 2007: Adelaide Town Hall

• Unedited audio transcript (13 mb mp3 file)

Co-presented by Adelaide Thinkers in Residence and The Bob Hawke Prime Ministerial Centre at UniSA

Dr Fraser Mustard is one of the world’s most respected authorities on early childhood development. Fraser will discuss the impact of early childhood development on the health, wellbeing and competence of the South Australian population in the 21st century.

Additional information on the Adelaide Thinkers in Residence program with Dr Fraser Mustard may be found on the Thinkers web site. 

The AW Jones Oration honours Dr Alby Jones, a South Australian educator who made a significant contribution to education locally, nationally and internationally.

The AW Jones Oration

The AW Jones Oration is a major function of the Australian College of Educators in South Australia. It has been held every second year since 1989 to celebrate the contribution of one of the State's most distinguished educators, Dr Albert Walter (Alby) Jones (1912 – 2003).

A former Director General of Education, Dr Alby Jones was a dominant figure in the state’s education system, an abiding influence at national and international level, and a key figure in the founding of the Australian College of Educators in 1959. Within SA, he was best known for his Freedom and Authority Memorandum, which delegated power to manage schools to their Principals, while urging them in turn to devolve authority to teachers and even students.

Alby Jones received many honours, including the gold medals of the Australian College of Educators and of the Australian Council of Educational Leaders, the Mackie Medal of the Australian Association for the Advancement of Science and Fellowships of several professional bodies. He was created an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1979.

The AW Jones Oration honours the memory of a well loved educator and through the Australian College of Educators, makes an ongoing contribution to the educational debate within Australia.

While the views presented by speakers within the Hawke Centre public program are their own and are not necessarily those of either the University of South Australia or The Hawke Centre, they are presented in the interest of open debate and discussion in the community and reflect our themes of: strengthening our democracy – valuing our cultural diversity – and building our future.