27 October 2025
Polar explorer and astronaut Eric Philips OAM is among seven outstanding leaders who were honoured at the University of South Australia’s final Alumni Awards event on Saturday night.
UniSA’s distinguished Alumni Award winners for 2025 were announced at a gala dinner on October 25, which took place at the University’s Pridham Hall, City West campus.
Together with Philips, awards were presented to Olympic sprint cyclist Matthew Glaetzer, Commissioner for Aboriginal Children and Young People Dale Agius, Aurecon CEO Louise Adams, Adelaide Fringe CEO Heather Croall AM, Bickford’s Group Managing Director Angelo Kotses and Chemist Warehouse CEO and co-founder Mario Verrocchi.
UniSA Vice Chancellor Professor David Lloyd says the University’s Alumni Awards celebrate the innovators and visionaries of its 250,000-strong global alumni community.
“It’s fantastic to bring the achievements of our diverse, pioneering alumni to the forefront, knowing that UniSA has played an important role in their journeys,” Prof Lloyd says.
“I am immensely proud of who we are honouring this year. They represent exceptional leadership and are wonderful role models for contributing to society through lives fuelled with purpose and passion.”
Philips says his UniSA training has been instrumental to his spectacular career in exploration, which includes guiding ski treks to the North and South Poles and adventuring into space earlier this year.
“My training at UniSA taught me how to take risks - which risks are worth taking and which ones are not,” Philips says.
“I could be taken by a polar bear, I could plunge through thin ice, fall into a crevasse; I could get hypothermia, I could get lost - but I didn’t.
“My education at UniSA has been absolutely pivotal in everything I did from then through to this moment now.”
Talking to a companion on a trek led to Philips’ recent space mission as a member of the first human flight to orbit over the North and South Poles – where he also became the first person in orbit under the Australian flag.
“It was a profound experience when we opened that nose cone and there was this vision of Earth, the entire horizon.
“I was moved to tears to recognise that there were humans living on this one rock. Not black, not white people or every shade in between, simply humans living there together.”
UniSA’s final Alumni Awards event was its biggest yet, emceed by UniSA graduate Channel 7 News presenter Rosanna Mangiarelli. To find out more about the 2025 awards visit: https://unisa.edu.au/connect/alumni-network/alumni-awards-and-recognition/alumni-awards/
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Media contact: Megan Andrews M: +61 434 819 275 E: megan.andrews@unisa.edu.au
