Emotional farewell for much-loved teacher
Schools
When school resumed last month there was one person who felt “very strange” that he wasn’t there to greet students at Tenison Woods College, Mount Gambier.
After 44 years at the school, and 47 years since he embarked on a career in Catholic education, Steve Primer retired at the end of 2024.
The English and Humanities teacher, who has taught three generations of one family, said while he still loved teaching, he was committed to retiring when he turned 70.
A young Steve with Tenison Woods staff
Originally from Henley South, Steve was a ‘bonded’ university student whereby his studies were paid for on the basis he would work for the Education Department for three years. But there was an over-supply of teaching graduates at the time and he was forced to drive forklifts as a job until the age of 24.
“One day I came home and found a telegram in the letterbox telling me to ring St Michael’s College about a job,” he recalled.
A three-week replacement position turned into a year of teaching and while there he found out about a job at the then Tenison College in Mount Gambier.
“I always say it pays to get to know the canteen ladies and the front office staff – they are the ones who told me about the job, I’d never even heard of Tenison Woods,” Steve said.
“I had an interview but didn’t get the job, then the other teacher became ill and so they rang me on the Sunday and asked me to start the next day.
“I had to pack up and drive there so I arrived on the Wednesday (of the first week of school) in 1979.”
Except for two years at the Ramsgate School in the UK after his first wife died, Steve has been in Mount Gambier ever since. He wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I loved it…I was sporty and played footy for Glencoe and cricket at Yahl,” he said.
“I met my first wife, a local girl, and we had four kids, it was a great place to raise children.”
Steve’s second wife Alison, who he married in Kent before returning to Mount Gambier in 2006, also took to life in the South-east town, and the couple has no intention of leaving.
Steve still umpires footy and is planning to travel and “do lots of work on the house” in his retirement.
During his 44 years at Tenison Woods College, he has seen it grow from a staff of 31 and 350 students in Years 8-12 to 300 staff and about 1400 students in ELC to Year 12.
He never tired of teaching at the school with every year and every class different.
“Tenison Woods really suited my personality; they are just overwhelmingly great kids,” he said.
The feeling is mutual with many students writing touching messages of gratitude to Steve for imbuing them with a love of learning and for his sense of humour.
One former student wrote the following: ‘Thank you for being you, thank you for your passion, your knowledge and your heart. Our lives, and I believe the world, are better off because of what you have imparted.’
At the end of his two years at the Ramsgate School a group of students even petitioned for him to stay.
Steve’s farewell was a funny and moving version of ‘This is Your Life’ with students and colleagues from different decades contributing and his children involved either in person or via video and phone messaging.
Principal David Mezinec said Steve was a person who was “genuinely interested in people” and “will not be forgotten by the many lives he touched”.
