Dr. Alison McIntosh

Snapshot:

• Industry / Sector: Academia & Research, Business / Corporate,

• Career Type: Retired & Active in the Community

• Education Pathway: University

• Mid Coast Connection: Born & raised on the Mid Coast

The Blurb:

Dr Alison McIntosh is the Chair of Taree Universities Campus and a passionate advocate for regional education. With a professional journey spanning corporate computing in Brisbane and Sydney, through to earning her PhD via distance education, Alison’s career has been defined by persistence and a meticulous attention to detail.

Now actively involved in community leadership in retirement, she finds joy in enabling others—particularly regional students—to dream big, upskill, and expand their horizons. Her story highlights the enduring power of education and the importance of staying the course.

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• Video Highlights

  • Current Role: Chair of Taree Universities Campus; retired from paid work but actively contributing to community advancement.

  • Career Path: From corporate Australia in early computing to academia and earning a PhD; transitioned into community leadership.

  • Key Skills: Persistence, attention to detail, endurance through challenges, commitment to lifelong learning.

  • Challenges Shared: Navigating PhD studies via distance education while managing personal life, pushing through doubts and complexity.

  • What She Loves: Helping the Mid Coast community access tertiary education and more choices through learning.

  • Advice to Younger Self: Follow the dream—if you love something, keep at it and remain open to unexpected opportunities.

• Key Quotes

  • “You don’t have to be the brightest—you just have to have the endurance and the persistence.”

  • “Having choices is such an enabling thing.”

  • “Have the dream, don’t narrow your outlook. Keep chasing it.”

  • “I think it would have given me more confidence to be perhaps a little bit more brave.”

• Transcript

  [0:10] Intro

  Hi, I'm Gemma. Thank you for joining us today for our Human Library video series. In this video series, we borrow people from the community to hear their stories and to showcase the diverse possibilities that are available in our community.

  Today we're joined by Alison McIntosh, the Chair of Taree Universities Campus. Today you'll hear Allison talk about her skills of persistence and attention to detail, and how she's used those skills to get to where she is today.

  [0:38] Hi Alison, can you tell us a little bit about what your professional life looks like for you today?

  I'm very happily in the land of retirement—although I say retired from paid work because it actually doesn't feel much like retirement many times! What with the involvement in TUC, which has been terrific, but pretty time-consuming.

  [1:03] Can you name and describe a skill that you've used through your life that's helped you to get to where you are today?

  My professional career probably goes back a very long way, given my birth year—which I won’t be revealing! I started off, my first decades actually, were in corporate Australia in Brisbane and then Sydney, in the very early days of computing.

  I think the skill that really helped me at that time was persistence and attention to detail. I think that’s possibly helped me all the way through—initially my corporate career, then some various other bits and pieces before I actually ended up in academia.

  Certainly doing my distance education university courses, including my doctorate, yes—persistence and attention to detail are probably the two that I would nominate.

  [2:12] You touched on using persistence and attention to detail through your distance studies and completing your doctorate. Can you think of another time in your professional career where using those skills really helped you achieve a goal?

  Certainly during my university years, that played a huge part—partly because of some issues happening in my personal life, but also I think doing the study from a distance requires a whole different approach to study.

  I do recall one of my mentors back in the days when I was contemplating doing my PhD saying, "You don’t have to be the brightest, you just have to have the endurance and the persistence to get through."

  Because I think in doing your PhD, you’ve got to learn how to jump through hoops—it’s part of it. You’ve just got to stay the course, and the rewards come at the end.

  [3:20] What do you love about your professional or personal life now?

  I love the fact that with Taree Universities Campus we are providing so many opportunities now for people to upskill—particularly through gaining tertiary qualifications.

  I’m very much aware that having an education, improving your education, just really makes available to you so many more opportunities and choices. Having choices is such an enabling thing.

  I’m sure our new graduates are finding that very much now in their professional lives. Being able to be part of that community—and for the whole of the Mid Coast—enabling people to achieve more, to have dreams, that to me is really important.

  [4:24] What do you think this says about your own personal values?

  I guess I’m a country girl, born and bred, even though I’ve spent a lot of years in big cities. I love coming back to the country. I appreciate living in a beautiful part of regional Australia.

  I’m just so happy that there are now many more opportunities for people in my community—in Taree, but also the other communities within this area—to achieve so much more.

  I think it’s just being part of a community that’s achieving so much and has so much more potential to offer our area.

  [5:19] What’s one piece of advice that you would give your younger self today?

  To have the dream, and to follow it. If you know there’s something you enjoy doing, it possibly also means you’re maybe good at it. Have the dream. Don’t narrow your outlook too much. Always keep your mind open for opportunities.

  But if you have that dream—just keep at it. Very likely you will achieve it somewhere along the way. You’ll have a lot of other adventures as well, and maybe a few detours, but finding something you love to do and keeping at it—keep chasing it. That’s what I’d say.

  [6:10] And what do you think it would have meant for your younger self to have heard that advice?

  I think it would have given me more confidence. I mean, I essentially left home when I went to boarding school at the age of 13. At age 17, I was living in a capital city nearly 2,000 kilometers from home.

  You’re very much alone when you’re in that situation, and I think it would have given me more confidence to be perhaps a little bit more brave somewhere along the way. It’s a hard one to reflect on, but I think having confidence.

Please note: All content is correct at the time of recording.