Left to right: Chris Rehn, Professor Jim Patrick, Jim Hungerford, Professor Greg Leigh, Alex Bond, the Hon. Marise Payne, Emeritus Professor Richard Henry and Dr Chris Roberts
Photographer: Paul Wright
Saturday’s Open House at the Australian Hearing Hub saw keynote addresses from the Federal Minister for Human Services, Senator the Hon. Marise Payne and from the Emeritus Professor Richard Henry AM, Acting Executive Dean of Faculty of Human Sciences explained that “the event provided an opportunity for the community to visit the Australian Hearing Hub and learn about hearing health, the services offered at the hub to both children and adults and see some amazing research facilities.”
The Australian Hearing Hub Open House event attracted over 300 people. The event provided opportunities for free hearing tests for children in the Macquarie University Speech and Hearing Clinic and adult hearing screening through Australian Hearing. During the event over 80 free hearing tests/screenings were completed.
The tours of the National Acoustic Laboratories, anechoic chamber and MQ photonics laser micromachining demonstrations were very popular with over 110 people signing up to have the opportunity to see both state of the art facilities in action.
Children had fun on the jumping castle, and also doing arts and crafts with the MQ Centre for Emotional Health and The Shepherd Centre. Buzz Lightyear also visited the event and met the children.
Experts provided short informative talks, including:
- Dr Teresa Ching, National Acoustic Laboratories,
NAL inventions that are making a difference to people’s hearing - Professor Greg Leigh, Royal Institute of Deaf and Blind Children,
The how and why of screening every newborn Australian for hearing - John Newall, Audiology, Department of Linguistics, Macquarie University
ListenApp for Schools - Dr Anne Fulcher, The Shepherd Centre
Developing social skills in children - Dr Elizabeth Beach, National Acoustic Laboratories & The HEARing CRC
Know your risk, take action to prevent hearing loss and be HEARsmart - Professor Jim Patrick, Cochlear Limited,
Benefits of implantable hearing technology - Dr Saskia Kohnen, MQ Cognition Clinic for Reading
Supporting children with dyslexia and reading difficulty - Associate Professor Maria Kangas, MQ Centre for Emotional Health
Children with anxiety and somatic health issues
Overall the feedback from the event was extremely positive.
The Australian Hearing Hub is an initiative of the Australian Government being conducted as part of the Education Investment Fund.
