Our Story

The Australian Indigenous Education Foundation was established in 2007 to replicate and scale the work its CEO, Andrew Penfold, had been doing in this field since 2004. One of our most frequently asked questions has been how and why AIEF came into being. Andrew's involvement in this work tracks back to his own childhood and has been shaped by his own life experiences.

An early insight

Andrew's father died at the age of 28 when Andrew was six years old and his mother was 27 with no career and no money. But his father’s life insurance provided some financial assistance for Andrew’s education.

By the time Andrew was 13, he was a rebellious teenager, lacking a father to counsel and guide him in these crucial teenage years and with a young mother working long hours in a restaurant in Glebe.

Living in Glebe, Andrew knocked about with many kids from the local Housing Commission flats in Glebe and Redfern. Through this, he came across many local Aboriginal kids and saw first-hand their disadvantage and alienation and the differences between his life and theirs. This gave Andrew his first insight into Aboriginal Australia.

A fresh start

By the time he was 15, Andrew had lived in 12 different houses and been to five different schools. As a younger teenager, he had a lot of freedom and was largely disengaged from studying, rarely scoring more than 30% in any of his school exams and was a disruptive influence on other kids at school. Seeing a crisis looming, Andrew’s mother and grandmother intervened and begged the headmaster at St Joseph’s College to accept Andrew into Joeys in Year 9.

In his first year at St Joseph’s College, Andrew remained rebellious. He jumped the walls and ran away several times, was suspended twice in his first six months, spent many Sundays in detention when other boys went out for the day, was in constant fights and obtained poor results in his school exams and reports, lingering at the bottom of his classes.

Things started to turn around in Year 10, with some intervention from Andrew’s Boarding Master, Br Anthony Boyd, who was also the coach of the 15As Rugby Team.  In Year 9, Andrew played in the 14Es but Br Anthony promoted him to the 15As in Year 10.

From strength to strength

Andrew's confidence and self-esteem grew and his life started changing in Year 10. He stopped rebelling and started working, and became good mates with the boys he had been fighting. In Year 10, Andrew was awarded a prize for Most Improved in Mathematics. In Year 11, he was awarded a prize for First Place in Mathematics, and in Year 12, he was awarded a prize for First Place Mathematics, History and Economics.

The beginnings of AIEF

Andrew then went on to university and received a Bachelor of Laws with Honours and had a successful career as a finance lawyer and investment banker over nearly 20 years with some of the biggest and most successful global firms in Sydney, London and Hong Kong. Andrew's successful career in law and investment banking gave him the capacity to dedicate five years of his life to Indigenous education work on a voluntary basis which led to the work of AIEF today.

Life-changing experiences

Andrew’s final catalyst came a decade later from the Bali bombings in 2002. Andrew’s Rugby team from the Hong Kong Football Club was killed in the Sari Club bombing whilst on a Rugby tour in 2002, which Andrew missed due to a family holiday. These were 12 friends that Andrew played Rugby with on Saturdays, socialised with on Friday and Saturday nights, had lunches with their families on Sundays, and trained with a couple of nights a week. All of them gone in one senseless act of carnage, which devastated their families and the broader Hong Kong community.

From this gut-wrenching traumatic experience something emerged that changed Andrew’s life again. Along with a couple of other mates in Hong Kong, Andrew drew upon his previous experience in law and banking to establish a charitable fund, called the Hong Kong Rugby Bali Fund. He became a trustee and company secretary of the fund, and chaired the fundraising committee, which raised over $2 million and distributed the funds to the widows and orphans of Andrew’s team mates, as well as supporting the education for around 100 children in Bali whose parents had been killed or injured.

Instead of living in grief over the traumatic devastation of Bali, Andrew now felt inspired and empowered. By giving his time and energy and drawing on his business experience in law and banking to help raise a substantial amount of money, he had helped to change the lives of people going through hell.

Inspired to act

At a BBQ with family and friends whilst visiting Sydney from Hong Kong in 2003, Andrew heard from his uncle that St Joseph’s College had started enrolling a small number of Indigenous boys. Andrew was intrigued and went with his wife and uncle to see the Headmaster. The Headmaster explained what the College was doing and Andrew was so inspired he offered to raise several million dollars on a voluntary basis so that the program could be expanded and sustained at the College and become a lighthouse project for other schools around the nation to replicate.

At this time, Andrew was still living in Hong Kong. But soon after, in August 2004, Andrew left the banking and finance world and 'retired' at the age of 38, moving back to Sydney with his wife and their three children. In September 2004, Andrew put a formal proposal to the College to establish the St Joseph’s College Indigenous Fund and the work began.

St Joseph’s College Indigenous Fund

Andrew worked on a full-time but voluntary basis establishing and running the St Joseph’s College Indigenous Fund for approximately five years and by the end of 2010 the fund had raised approximately $6.4 million – at no cost to donors – and currently helps to support up to 40 Indigenous boys in perpetuity at the College.

The dedication of five years of Andrew’s life, working around the clock on a voluntary basis, was the culmination of three personal experiences that still drive Andrew’s determination in this work:

1. His own experience seeing how a great school with great teachers, facilities and support could change the trajectory of someone as disengaged and rebellious as he was into a successful educational outcome and career.

2. His exposure to disadvantaged Aboriginal kids from his teenage days knocking about in Glebe and Redfern.

3. His experience in Hong Kong from the Bali bombings – seeing how he could use his own skills and experience to do something positive and constructive to help others rebuild their shattered lives.

AIEF

In the eight years since Andrew embarked on this journey, he and his team have witnessed first-hand the stunning results being achieved by the Indigenous students and schools they work with, making them determined to keep working hard to provide these opportunities for thousands of marginalised Indigenous children. This resolve led to the establishment of AIEF in 2007, to replicate and scale the work commenced at St Joseph’s College on a larger, national basis.

After 18 months of detailed discussions with the Australian Government, in mid-2009, AIEF signed an agreement for the Government to contribute $20 million to the AIEF Scholarship Program, with AIEF undertaking to raise an additional $20 million from individual, corporate and philanthropic investors.

This $40 million joint venture underpins AIEF’s target of educating 2,000 marginalised Indigenous children in financial need through a sustainable and robust 20-year business model, and supporting them in their transition from Year 12 to tertiary education and meaningful careers.

From small deeds done, big things grow

AIEF’s long-term and unique model provides investors with something that has never existed in this country before and has been desperately needed:

1. A low-cost and genuinely sustainable long-term program for Indigenous education.

2. A program with proven and tangible results to get some of the nation’s neediest children into the nation’s leading schools and into meaningful careers.

3. A non-profit organisation driven by hard heads, soft hearts and capable hands with strong corporate DNA.

4. Regular, transparent and detailed annual reporting and strong governance in a framework of best practice, drawing on decades of successful results and the corporate experience of our CEO, Directors, Ambassadors and staff under the patronage of some of the nation’s wisest and most respected civic leaders.

AIEF is passionately and unrelentingly focused on success and results and is defining best practice in real time.

The more funds we raise, the more Indigenous scholarships we offer, the more lives can be changed.

Small deeds done are better than big deeds planned, and AIEF’s evolution demonstrates that from small deeds done, big things grow.

Please support our work and make history by contributing to the future of our story and the future of Indigenous Australia.