Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

After more than 25 years spent creating one of Queensland's most outstanding independent schools, Dr Lyn Bishop has announced her plan to step down this year from her role as Principal of Sheldon College. Lyn has dedicated her life to young people's education. She notes that teaching is not a profession but a calling. It's ironic that, after ill health early in her life and the advice from a careers guidance officer that she should choose something more within her range of abilities, she has achieved what she has. Those words made her only more determined. Now, with multiple bachelor's and master's degrees and a PhD in Education Administration, Lyn is a fully qualified psychologist and JP and has lectured in the Master of Business Administration program at QUT.

In 1999 Dr Bishop was awarded AIM Professional Manager of the Year, and in 2019 she was awarded the OAM for service to education in Queensland and the prestigious EY Queensland Entrepreneur of the Year and Australian Entrepreneur of the Year for a Community, Social and Not-For-Profit Enterprise, the first time it had been awarded in the field of education—not bad for someone who'd been told that they wouldn't amount to much. At that time, of course, the glass ceiling was not insignificant for women in the professions, but Lyn never saw it that way. She viewed it as a self-imposed limitation. In describing it she says: 'After all, no-one has control over your mental attitude except you. It's really about what you think you are not that holds you back.' Over 25 years, Dr Bishop has proved that very little has.

Dr Bishop was the executive director of the metropolitan east region and acting director of quality assurance in the central office. Ironically, her travel was taking her away from her work with children, which she loved the most. Her first love, being children, brought her to resign from Education Queensland in 1996. Remarkably, it was in 1997, one year later, that she started Sheldon College. That vision was against all the odds. The story goes back 50 years or so, when she moved with her mum to Tambo. Her grandfather was a shearer, and Lyn led a very hard life, but they were the origins of her designing what would ultimately become Sheldon College. She did it around a kitchen table. No-one was willing to back her ideas. Eventually it was David Jull, the federal member for Bowman at the time, who was the first politician to back her. Banks wouldn't—families had to give collateral—but ultimately it happened.

In a recent letter to parents, Dr Bishop noted that she's confident the college will continue to achieve extraordinary outcomes into the future. She added that she's incredibly proud of what she has achieved as a principal, just as my city is so proud of what she has done over 2½ decades. Those students who have gone through Sheldon College carry within them a gem that will allow them to change the world. For every woman who was inspired by Lyn Bishop and for those in the future who will benefit from the college, the entire south-east of Queensland, and my city of Redlands in particular, say a sincere thankyou.