Honouring Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue at ESA

ESA news

15 December 2025

ESA marked the naming of the O’Donoghue Meeting Room in honour of Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue, with a visit from her niece, Deb Edwards, Head of the Lowitja O’Donoghue Foundation.

Education Services Australia

Diversity & inclusion
Working at ESA

Education Services Australia was honoured to welcome Deb Edwards, Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue’s niece and Head of the Lowitja O’Donoghue Foundation, to our office following the naming of a meeting room in Dr O’Donoghue’s honour.

The naming of this room is one of the ways ESA is strengthening relationships and deepening our understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures as part of our Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan. Through our Innovate RAP, we are committed to building respectful connections, creating culturally safe spaces, and acknowledging the leadership of First Nations peoples whose work continues to shape Australia.

Celebrating an extraordinary legacy

A Yankunytjatjara woman, the late Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue AC CBE DSG was arguably Australia’s most recognised Aboriginal woman. Dr O’Donoghue’s lifetime contribution to the advancement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander rights, produced significant outcomes in health, education, political representation, land rights, and reconciliation.

The Lowitja O’Donoghue Foundation was established on 1 August 2022, in honour of this significant day, the 90th birthday of Dr O’Donoghue. The Foundation acknowledges, recognises, and preserves the extraordinary legacy of Dr O’Donoghue’s dedicated lifetime of work and creates opportunities for advancement and change.

Lowitja Institute, Australia’s only national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community controlled health research institute, is named in honour of its Co-Patron, Dr O’Donoghue.

Deb’s visit to ESA

During her visit, Deb spent time in the newly named O’Donoghue Room with our CEO Stuart Mitchell and Reconciliation Action Plan Working Group member Colin McNeil, reflecting on Dr O’Donoghue’s legacy. Deb reflected on the visit:

We deeply appreciate the honouring of the late Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue through the naming of a meeting room at the offices of Education Services Australia in Naarm. It was a pleasure to visit recently to yarn in the O’Donoghue Room with Stuart and Colin and to see all the rooms named after so many of our trailblazing First Nations leaders.

ESA is grateful to Deb for her visit and for generously sharing her insights and reflections. Moments like this continue to guide our reconciliation journey and strengthen our commitment to learning, listening, and working in partnership with First Nations communities.

Education Services Australia

Education Services Australia (ESA) was established by education ministers in 2010 to help advance nationally agreed education initiatives. We collaborate with government schools and industry to create sustainable, transformative solutions that promote equitable access to quality education from early childhood through to secondary school.

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