Active Living - An Inspirational Story

Phyllis Turner posing for photographers after receiving her degree

Great-great-granny gains MSc at 94

Bernard Lagan in Sydney

A 94-year-old great-great-grandmother, who left school when she was 12, has become the oldest person to earn a masters degree.
Phyliss Turner was awarded her higher degree in medical science at a ceremony in her home town of Adelaide, as generations of her family looked on. She left an inner-Sydney primary school before reaching her teens to help her mother to look after her brothers and sisters after her father left the family.
Her supervisor, Maciej Henneberg, said that discussions with international colleagues and internet research led him to believe that Mrs Turner was the oldest person in the world to gain a masters degree.
After marrying and bringing up her seven children and two stepchildren, she completed her school education at night, “because I love study”. In spite of her own achievement, she was proudest of her own children and stepchildren, she said.
Mrs Turner began her degree studies at Adelaide University when she was 70, and at 72 won a 12-month scholarship to study at the University of California. “I entered university when I was 70 and I came top in the essay section when I did my entry exam,” she said.
After her year in California, she returned to the Australian National University to graduate with a BA in anthropology in 1986.
Mrs Turner, who has lived in Adelaide since 1948, was 90 when she moved to the university medical school to do her masters after gaining honours in anthropology in 2002. Her thesis was on Australian settlement before European colonisation.
Professor Henneberg has urged Mrs Turner to continue her studies to a doctorate but she has so far declined. “People survive to 101 but rarely with a mind so young,” he said. “Her intellect is capable of completing a PhD, but her health is less certain,” he said. A PhD would take about three years.
“I feel very, very happy after five years of study, but sorry that I am just a little bit immobilised,” said Mrs Turner, who uses a walking stick. “I don’t feel old and I would like to go on to further study, but I am a bit of a liability to other people now.” Professor Henneberg said “Phil” had “a lively and fresh intellect”, while her son Tom said his mother “has an amazing brain”. Her family hope to have her achievement acknowledged by Guinness World Records.

I is a really pleasure to post this wonderful news. Warm regards to Mrs Turner. Active Living - an real life example. What an inspiration for all of us.