Piccoli served as the Minister for Education between April 2011 and January 2017, in both the O'Farrell and Baird ministries.

[3] Prior to starting his political career, Piccoli worked as an irrigation rice farmer and solicitor.

[10] Prior to the 2011 state election, Barry O'Farrell made a pre-election pledge of not scrapping the ethics classes.

[13][14] Mike Baird's coalition government won the 2015 state election, promising to lease parts of the electricity grid to private operators, while Fred Nile held the balance of power in the upper house.

[18] Adrian Piccoli's department blocked access to the chairman of Primary Ethics, despite holding meetings with faith-based lobby groups.

[20] On 4 September 2017, Piccoli announced he was resigning from parliament to accept a position at the University of New South Wales.