The work of First Nations rights advocate, Bidjara and Birri-Gubba Juru woman Jacqueline Huggins AM FAHA, has been honoured by Flinders University for her exceptional leadership creating an equitable future for Indigenous people.

Professor Huggins, known as 'Jackie', was awarded the 2025 John Moriarty AM Impact Award for exceptional leadership in Australia's Reconciliation movement and her commitment to creating an equitable future for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

She was presented with the inaugural honour for her advocacy work across Reconciliation, social justice and Indigenous rights at the awards, which recognise significant contributions from Flinders University graduates in the community, the university or their chosen field.

Professor Huggins was honoured alongside 12 outstanding high achievers at the Flinders Alumni Awards ceremony in Adelaide.

She began her university studies as a mature-age student aged 26, with a passion to elevate her position and status through higher education.

"University education provided my liberation and wider understanding of the world, establishing my voice for my people in the community," said Professor Huggins, now a director of Indigenous Research at the University of Queensland.

She recalled her time at Flinders University in the 1980s, studying Honours in Women's Studies, which galvanised her objective thinking and critical analysis skills and emboldened her leadership ambitions.

"It was only through my time at university that I learned I was a writer - and now I've written seven books," she said.

"But my time there also gave me confidence to be a better leader, with a more considered understanding of the politics that surrounds issues affecting First Nations people.

"It gave me the skills to think deeply and find solutions through both policy and practical action."

Acting Vice-Chancellor Professor Romy Lawson congratulated Professor Huggins and the rest of the 2025 winning cohort.

"From advocacy for First Nations rights to medicine, law, agriculture and science, our 2025 awardees are change leaders and innovators," Professor Lawson said.

"The John Moriarty AM Impact Award recognises a graduate whose exceptional efforts have significantly enhanced the wellbeing, empowerment, and advancement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

"Dr Jacqueline Huggins embodies the spirit of this inaugural award through her lifetime of work as a First Nations historian."

Professor Huggins became the ABC's inaugural Elder in Residence earlier this year, a role she is delighted to undertake.

"I'm helping to guide the next generation of Indigenous leaders, who are operating across wider areas of business, government and organisations to achieve improved social justice for First Nations people," she said.

From 2017 to 2019, Professor Huggins was co-chair of the National Congress of Australia's First Peoples, a representative body of 10,000 members and 180 organisations to provide a leading voice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

She helped create the First Nations Australia Writers Network in 2012 and remains its patron.

She is also patron of Reconciliation Queensland, National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Women's Alliance, Sisters Inside (which advocates for the rights of incarcerated girls and women), and Black Rainbow, which supports Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people who identify as LBGTQ+.

"I think there is a clear obligation that when you have education, when you have any kind of elevated role in the community, it is incumbent upon you to give back to community," she said.

"I've always felt that's been a very strong focus in my life, and the purpose of why I do what I do - because I know I'm a privileged Aboriginal person now. I've worked damn hard, to make myself comfortable in my own skin, also in terms of my economic power, and I want that for all my people."

Her inspiration to drive positive change is propelled by worrying statistics - 85 per cent of the people in Australia reportedly say they have never met or had a conversation with an Indigenous person. She believes it's only education of the emerging generations - from kindergarten to university - which can change this situation.

"If you give logical arguments to people who know nothing about First Nations people, you educate them - and I've seen many people transformed once they get information and education about our people," she said.

"We all have to listen deeply to what Aboriginal people are telling us."

Norman Waterhouse principal Nick Llewellyn-Jones was recognised at the ceremony for his legal representation of First Nations communities.

The leading Native Title expert also practices in resources and renewable energy law and was acknowledged for advancing justice for Indigenous communities as the recipient of a Distinguished Alumni Award.

"We're trying to provide economic justice, which is consistent with a deep-seated view I have of the need to build an ethical capitalism," Mr Llewellyn-Jones said.