They built something from grief, not away from it.
Each year, a nation pauses to ask itself who, among its people, has quietly made life more bearable, more possible, or more meaningful for others. South Australia has answered that question with twenty nominees for the 2026 Australian of the Year Awards — a group spanning ages sixteen to seventy-nine, whose contributions range from outer space to prison yards, from digitised weather charts to children's picture books. Their stories, taken together, suggest that the work of building a society happens not only in parliaments and laboratories but in grief, in community halls, and in the long patience of those who simply refuse to stop.
- Australia's first qualified astronaut stands alongside a teenager who lobbied her premier for five million dollars in mental health funding — the breadth of the nominee slate signals that extraordinary contribution takes no single form.
- Several nominees built their life's work from personal loss: a man who continued his late fiancée's defence welfare organisation, a couple who turned their son's death into a foundation raising over 1.4 million dollars for families facing terminal illness.
- The awards surface contributions that rarely make headlines — two decades of digitising nineteenth-century weather charts, twenty years improving maternal healthcare in the Pacific, and a video podcast that gave young men a place to speak about suicide.
- South Australia will select one winner per category at a November fourteenth ceremony in Adelaide, with four state representatives then competing at the national finals in Canberra on Australia Day Eve, January 2026.
South Australia has named twenty nominees across four categories for the 2026 Australian of the Year Awards, a group that ranges in age from sixteen to seventy-nine and whose work spans space engineering, cinema, conservation, mental health, and community care.
Leading the main Australian of the Year category is Katherine Bennell-Pegg, forty, who became Australia's first qualified astronaut after graduating from Basic Astronaut Training in 2024, having been selected from more than twenty-two thousand applicants. She shares the category with Paul Broadbridge, who has grown Australian Partners of Defence — an organisation founded by his late fiancée — into a national network serving nearly two hundred thousand defence families. Also nominated are Professor Marion Eckert, whose nursing research centre has produced AI-powered skin cancer detection tools for remote communities, and Dr Mohammad Afzal Mahmood, whose two decades of work in Timor Leste, Indonesia, and Papua New Guinea have measurably reduced maternal and infant mortality.
The Senior Australian of the Year nominees include James Currie, seventy-nine, whose sound design shaped films from Breaker Morant to Red Dog across five decades of Australian cinema, and Malcolm Benoy, who has led volunteers in digitising more than ninety thousand historical weather charts now used by international climate researchers. Rosa Matto introduced generations of South Australians to Italian cuisine and received Italy's Order of the Star in 2023, while Dr David Paton co-founded a conservation organisation that has restored hundreds of hectares of habitat.
Among the Young Australian nominees, Chloe Wyatt-Jasper, sixteen, drew on her own experience of domestic violence and mental health struggles to successfully lobby the South Australian premier for five million dollars in youth mental health funding. Amelia Griffin founded a therapy service and developed two apps providing affordable communication assistance for people with autism and dementia, while Amira Shahin delivers mental health education in schools and donates all proceeds from her three bestselling children's books to humanitarian causes.
The Local Hero category includes Callum MacPherson, who created a men's mental health podcast after losing a friend to suicide — now past two hundred fifty episodes and winner of a national podcast award. Linda Fisk and Anna Kemp run a peer-led program helping women transition from prison, and Ella and Jarrod Stratton established the Hunter Alfred Stratton Foundation after losing their twelve-year-old son, raising over 1.4 million dollars to support families navigating terminal illness.
State winners will be announced on November fourteenth in Adelaide, with four South Australian representatives advancing to the national ceremony in Canberra on January twenty-fifth, 2026.
South Australia has named twenty people for its 2026 Australian of the Year Awards, a slate that reads like a cross-section of the state's quiet achievers: an astronaut who trained in Germany, a sound designer who shaped fifty years of Australian cinema, a cook who brought Italian culture to a generation, a teenager who lobbied her premier for mental health funding, and a woman who lost her son and turned that grief into a foundation that has raised 1.4 million dollars for families facing terminal illness.
The nominees span four categories and range in age from sixteen to seventy-nine. Katherine Bennell-Pegg, forty, made history as Australia's first qualified astronaut, graduating from Basic Astronaut Training in 2024 after being selected from more than twenty-two thousand applicants. She works as a space engineer and has become a regular presence in schools and boardrooms, talking about Australia's emerging space program and the opportunities it might open for young people. Alongside her are Paul Broadbridge, a veterans advocate who runs Australian Partners of Defence, an organisation that now serves nearly two hundred thousand members nationwide offering career support and wellbeing resources to defence personnel and their families. The organisation was founded by Broadbridge's fiancée, Rebecca Waller, who died of cancer; he has continued her vision since her death.
In the health and research categories, the nominees include Professor Marion Eckert, fifty-six, whose work in nursing and midwifery research has produced everything from online wellbeing tools to AI-powered skin cancer detection services in remote regions. She directs the Rosemary Bryant AO Research Centre, one of the world's leading hubs for evidence-based nursing research. Dr Mohammad Afzal Mahmood, sixty-three, has spent more than two decades improving maternal healthcare in Timor Leste, Indonesia, and Papua New Guinea, work that has measurably reduced maternal and infant mortality. Gareth Baynam, a clinical geneticist, rounds out the main Australian of the Year category.
The Senior Australian of the Year nominees include James Currie, seventy-nine, whose sound design work appears on films like Breaker Morant, Bad Boy Bubby, Wolf Creek, and Red Dog—a filmography that essentially documents South Australia's contribution to Australian cinema over five decades. Malcolm Benoy, seventy-eight, has volunteered with the Bureau of Meteorology for two decades, leading a citizen science group that has digitised more than ninety thousand historical weather charts from the nineteenth century, records now used by international climate researchers to reconstruct southern hemisphere weather patterns. Rosa Matto, seventy-one, introduced generations of South Australians to Italian cuisine through radio, television, and print, and in 2023 received the Order of the Star of Italy from the Italian government. Dr David Paton, seventy-two, co-founded Bio-R, a conservation organisation that has restored hundreds of hectares of habitat and draws thousands of people to annual planting festivals.
The Young Australian of the Year category includes Amelia Griffin, twenty-eight, who founded My Mind Matters Therapy and created two apps that provide affordable communication assistance to people with speech difficulties from autism and dementia. Hayley Frazer, twenty-one, published her first picture book at fifteen and now runs storytelling sessions and creative workshops for neurodiverse children and adults. Amira Shahin, twenty-four, founded Mindful Pursuits to deliver mental health education in schools and works with Still Aware, a charity focused on preventing stillbirths; she has written three bestselling children's books and donates all proceeds to humanitarian causes. Chloe Wyatt-Jasper, sixteen, has spoken publicly about her experience of domestic violence and mental health challenges and successfully lobbied South Australia's premier for five million dollars in funding for improved mental health services for young people.
The Local Hero category recognises people working at the community level. Linda Fisk and Anna Kemp run Seeds, a peer-led program that helps women transition from prison to community life and hosts weekly lunches where women access clothing, food, and support from others with lived experience. Callum MacPherson, thirty-one, created Young Blood—Men's Mental Health, a video podcast that has released more than two hundred fifty episodes and won Best Wellbeing Podcast at the 2024 Australian Podcast Awards; he started it after losing a friend to suicide and could not find a platform where young men could share their struggles. Ayesha Fariha Safdar founded the Adelaide Pakistani Women's Association in 2010 to help newly arrived migrant and refugee women navigate Australian life, acquire language skills, and find employment. Ella Stratton and her husband Jarrod lost their twelve-year-old son, Hunter, to a life-limiting illness; they established the Hunter Alfred Stratton Foundation in response, which has raised more than 1.4 million dollars to support families facing terminal illness through care packages, meals, gifts, and access to a beach house holiday home.
One nominee will be selected from each category to represent South Australia at the national Australian of the Year Awards, to be held in Canberra on January twenty-fifth, 2026. The state winners will be announced on November fourteenth at a ceremony at the National Wine Centre in Adelaide. Across all of Australia, one hundred thirty-four people have been nominated in this year's awards.
Notable Quotes
The nominees for the South Australia awards are extraordinary in their respective fields and endeavours—humanitarians, advocates for those in need, researchers transforming lives through technology, and those who have devoted their lives to their passions, causes, and art.— Mark Fraser AO CVO, CEO of National Australia Day Council
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
What strikes you most about this particular group of nominees?
The range of it. You have someone who trained as an astronaut in Germany and someone who spent decades digitising nineteenth-century weather charts by hand. A teenager who lobbied her premier and a woman who turned the death of her child into a foundation that's now raised 1.4 million dollars. They're not all famous. Most of them aren't.
Why does that matter?
Because it suggests the awards are actually looking at what people do quietly, over time, in their communities. Not just the visible achievements. The sound designer who's been working for fifty years, the cook who's been teaching people about Italian culture for four decades.
There's a lot of grief in these stories.
Yes. Rebecca Waller's death, Hunter Stratton's death, Callum MacPherson's friend's suicide. These people didn't turn away from that. They built something from it.
Do you see a pattern in what these nominees are doing?
Connection. They're all trying to connect people to something—to opportunity, to community, to themselves. The astronaut connecting kids to space. The speech pathologist connecting people with communication tools. The women's association connecting migrants to employment and language. Even the meteorologist, in a way—connecting past weather data to future climate understanding.
What happens next?
Four of them will go to the national awards in January. But the others—they'll keep doing what they're doing. That's the thing about these people. The award doesn't change their work. It just names it.