Tribute to Andrea Gallant

It is with great love and admiration that I reflect on the life and work of our esteemed colleague, Andrea Gallant; to pay tribute to the contributions she has made to the field of teacher education in her home in Australia, and abroad. She possessed a strong work ethic balanced with a great sense of humor, which made her the kind of colleague with whom we all wish to work.

Andrea was born in Hobart, Tasmania, a proud and strong Palawa (First Nations) woman. Most of her childhood was spent in the Northwest of Tasmania, and life there was not always easy. By age 16 she had left school and by 20 was the mother of two young children. Yet Andrea was easily recognizable for her ever-present smile and cheerful demeanor. In her late twenties, she had the opportunity to be trained as a lifeline counselor, which led to her lifelong passion and eventual career in education. In 1994, at the age of 33, she had earned her BEd with honors in Educational Psychology, and began her teaching career in Tasmania, teaching English and History. Eventually, she moved to Melbourne to pursue doctoral work under Bernie Neville. In 2007, she won both the Stewart Fraser Award for Exemplary Thesis Writing as well as the La Trobe University Research Thesis Merit Citation for her thesis entitled, “Gebser goes to school: Ecozoic worldview, structures of consciousness, contextual thinking and systemic disruptions.”