He completed his secondary education at the Kirkwall Grammar School in Orkney funded by a county scholarship.

The University of Alberta was just beginning to establish itself as an important post-secondary institution when it offered Robert Wallace the presidency in 1928.

[4] Wallace's presidency was less than one year old when the global economy began to collapse into the Great Depression in the fall of 1929.

Needless to say, Wallace chose the latter action, and no departments at the university were closed despite the desperate economic situation.

Despite the massive monetary restrictions placed on him by the Great Depression, Wallace managed not only to maintain the integrity and viability of the institution, but to improve it as well.

(Previous to this development, nursing students studying at Alberta had to travel to Ontario or British Columbia to complete their degrees.)

Wallace was also among the first geologists to suggest that there may be economic potential in the development of the tar sands on the outskirts of Fort McMurray.

Prior to Wallace's arrival, growth at Queen's University had stagnated significantly (as it had with most other institutions during the depression years).

Wallace also defended so-called "left wing" professors during the intense anti-communist atmosphere of the cold war, refusing to fire those staff members despite heated calls for their dismissal.

[5] It was during his tenure at Queen's that Wallace became highly regarded nationally (and internationally) as an extremely effective and efficient academic administrator.

He was one of just three Canadians chosen to represent the country at the United Nations Conference for the establishment of an educational and cultural organization (ECO/CONF) held in London in November 1945.

Controversially, Robert Wallace was a prominent and outspoken advocate of eugenics and selective breeding programs, particularly during his time in Alberta.

In an address to the Canadian Medical Association entitled "The Quality of the Human Stock" in Calgary in June 1934, Wallace asserted the following: Wallace, along with fellow University of Alberta faculty member John MacEachran, was a frank supporter of Alberta's eugenic legislation, including the 1928 Sexual Sterilization Act, which permitted the forcible sterilization of "undesirables" in the province.

Following his retirement from Queen's in 1951, Wallace joined the newly formed Arctic Institute of North America (AINA), which at that time was housed at McGill University in Montreal.

Having spent many years exploring the vast Northern regions of Manitoba and Alberta, Wallace was ideally suited to the task.