Eden Rigo
Eden Rigo (2015) was recently selected, from a field of six worthy candidates, as the 2025 Rhodes Scholar for Western Australia. Eden is our second Rhodes Scholar, the first being Dr Bronte Adams AM (1980), and we could not be more proud of her incredible achievement!
Eden, the younger sister of Gioia Rigo (2010), came to Newman College in Year 5 and loved her years here, and has many fond memories of teachers and other staff. In Romero Guild, she was in the ACC Athletics and Swimming Teams, and played Basketball, Touch Football and Volleyball. She set a near record for protractor throwing in Maths in Year 10, a new record for Shot Put in Year 11, was the Female Age Swimming Champion in Years 11 and 12, and Year 12 Drama Captain. Eden was also in Remar in Years 10, 11 and 12 (the faith in action group now known as Game Changer) which, she says, kick-started her love for community service.
Eden chose not go straight into university, instead taking time to travel. In doing so, she built a store of life experiences backpacking around Europe for eight months, living in Broome for six months, travelling through Indonesia and Malaysia for nearly five months, and teaching English online at a summer school. When not travelling she worked in hospitality in Perth, mostly during the summers.
She began her Bachelor of Urban and Regional Planning at Curtin University in 2021, aged 23, and is now completing her Honours. During her studies she has won several awards, including attaining the highest academic standing across her entire degree. She has twice attained Membership to the Vice Chancellor’s list, recognising the top 1% of undergraduates, and received the Don Watts High Achievers’ Scholarship. She has also undertaken three New Colombo Plan Mobility programs, which have taken her to the Maldives and three Micronesian countries. When she graduates, her degree will have taken her to eight different Asia/Pacific countries, and twice to the United Nations – the second in November this year for COP29, the UN Climate Change Conference in Baku, Azerbaijan.
In her spare time Eden coordinates the mentoring of a women’s politics program and, as part of her activities with the Osborne Park Rotary Club (of which she has been a member for three years), arranges social gatherings for Ukrainian refugees. She has also held various leadership roles across political and student planning associations.
She has worked in the private sector, in the Community and Culture team at Element Advisory and, for the past two years, has been the Executive Officer of the State Parliamentary Labor Party at Parliament House.
As far as her Rhodes Scholarship, which will take her to Oxford University, Eden hopes to study a Masters in Philosophy in Development Studies, as she’s aiming for a career which is impactful for at-risk and vulnerable communities. She aims to learn as much as she can at Oxford so she can foster sustainable and thriving communities in future.
We wish Eden the very best with her studies next year, and in bringing her plans to fulfillment!