It’s here!
The 2025 ACEL NSW and National Awards are now open for nominations. It’s time to start thinking about those leaders who you see making professional impact, either at our state level, or even more widely across the nation.
For the last 50 years, ACEL has been the pre-eminent national professional association for leaders and emerging leaders, a reputation built on the shoulders of such giants as Frank Crowther, Partick Duignan, Michelle Bruniges, Martin Westwell, Ann McIntyre, Sandra Milligan, and John Cleary. In New South Wales, we have been enriched through the contribution of luminaries such as Joanne Jarvis, Murat Dizdar, Prof Br David Hall FMS, Associate Professor Kylie Lipscombe, Christine Cawsey, and Professor Nicole Mockler (check out the full list of NSW awardees here). Now is the opportunity for you to contribute to this legacy.
There’s plenty of awards around these days, but there are some critical factors which set ACEL awards apart from all others. ACEL is a professional association unique in Australia. It is genuinely cross-sectoral in having members and award winners from all three school sectors – government, Catholic, and independent. It is genuinely multi-tiered, welcoming educators from early childhood, primary, secondary, tertiary, and education system leadership contexts. This matrix-like profile generates a richness of conversation, collaboration, and practice which benefits education in the broadest sense possible. With over 4000 members nationally, of which nearly 1200 are based in New South Wales, its scope and impact are without comparison.
Our awards are held in high esteem because of the rigour and manner of the process of their giving. Each year, individuals and teams are first nominated and seconded by others who have spent time and effort documenting evidence of the leadership impact demonstrated by nominees. Nominations are then reviewed and validated by a panel of experienced educators from the NSW Executive Committee (for state awards) and a National Awards Committee (for national awards). Recommendations for state awards are then ratified by the entire NSW Branch Executive Committee, and, for national awards, by the National Board.
These thorough and rigorous processes are why ACEL Awards are held in high esteem across what has, over the past decade or so, become quite a crowded landscape of awards. It is why our award winners can take great encouragement that the honour extended to them comes through one of the most valued forms of acknowledgement, that of peers who see first-hand the impact of outstanding leadership.
So now is the time to start thinking and gathering evidence for your nomination. You can check out each of the eight available categories for NSW awards, and each of the eight national awards below.
NOMINATE FOR NATIONAL AWARDS
NOMINATE FOR NSW BRANCH AWARDS
NOMINATE FOR NEW VOICE SCHOLARSHIP
Paul Kidson
ACEL NSW Branch President