How the QBE Foundation helped Colleen give back to The Shepherd Centre
- Colleen Chapman successfully worked with The Shepherd Centre to apply for a QBE Foundation local grant of $25,000 in the QBE Employee Choice category
- The Shepherd Centre empowers children with hearing loss and their families to develop crucial listening, spoken language and social skills
- The QBE Foundation local grant will fund their Kidscape program, which engages children in therapeutic play to give them confidence to enter mainstream learning.
In Australia, 1 in 1000 babies are diagnosed with hearing loss at birth. It’s one of the most common disabilities diagnosed at newborn stage, with numbers increasing to 1 in 300 children by school age. Despite the statistics, 50% of Australian children do not receive the specialist support that they need to "realise their full potential."1
QBE General Manager of Assurance and Frameworks, Colleen Chapman, knows better than anyone how hard it is to find the right support when your child is diagnosed with hearing loss. Her son was born "profoundly deaf", and Chapman says it came as a surprise.
"We had no history of deafness in our family, so we were in shock. It was really hard to get information. We did the rounds of early intervention providers – and when we walked through the door of The Shepherd Centre… it felt like home."
Helping children with hearing loss find their voice
The Shepherd Centre was founded in 1970 by Dr Bruce Shepherd and his wife Annette when they couldn’t find anywhere to teach their child with hearing loss how to listen and speak. For over 50 years The Shepherd Centre has been running child-safe, early intervention programs that empower children and their parents to "flourish in a noisy, hearing-enabled world."
"Many children who start at The Shepherd Centre are under the 3-month age", says Key Relationship Executive at The Shepherd Centre, Jane Scott.
"Early identification and the fitting of the correct hearing aids coupled with the right therapy sessions allows children to enter school with the same level of language as their hearing peers… if not better," she adds.
Even more than that, The Shepherd Centre provides a "sense of community" that connects children and their families with people who are on the same journey – helping to overcome social isolation and providing a sense of belonging, so that they don’t feel like "the only ones" and giving them the confidence to advocate for themselves in the world.
Chapman agrees. "We felt so welcome," she says. "People were really understanding. I truly felt like I was part of a community."
A positive impact on families
It’s this sense of belonging and connection, that has kept Chapman working with the charity. She is now on the Board of Directors and is so proud she was able to successfully advocate for them to receive a QBE Foundation local grant.
The QBE Foundation works with charitable organisations to create strong, resilient and inclusive communities. Its work focuses on climate resilience and inclusion – two areas important to QBE and where it believes it can have the greatest impact.
In 2021, the local grant program invited applications working across three areas of need, and also included a fourth category – the QBE Employee Choice category.
For Chapman, it was the perfect opportunity to support The Shepherd Centre’s Kidscape program.
"Kidscape engages children in safe, therapeutic play such as arts and craft, music, and storytelling that helps them build crucial communication and socialisation skills," says Scott.
"It means they can confidently enter other social situations and thrive. Parents can also use the time to connect with each other over a cup of tea or attend an information session."
This weekly program is not funded by the NDIS, which is why support from the QBE Foundation has meant so much.
"The QBE Foundation local grant means that 50 families can attend the Kidscape program over the next 12 months. It will help set children up for an even better future," says Scott.
"Why this grant is so significant is that this program can help kids go on to enter mainstream learning situations at school, then into the wider community with more opportunities available to them. It also gives a better perspective for the whole community on diversity, on different skill sets and the acceptance of differences."
QBE employees get behind The Shepherd Centre
The Shepherd Centre – and Chapman’s experience with the charity – captured the hearts and minds of QBE employees too. As part of the local grant program, QBE employees were given the opportunity to review shortlisted applications and vote for the winning recipients. On an assessment call, they were able to hear Chapman’s story and learn about the work of The Shepherd Centre – leading to an overwhelming number of people voting in favour of the grant.
QBE Foundation Co-Chair Jon Fox noted that the work of The Shepherd Centre aligns with QBE’s focus on accessibility inclusion for all and enabling equitable opportunities, but he also felt the voting showed QBE’s team culture and desire to support one another.
"QBE employees showed so much emotion hearing Colleen’s story," says Fox. "It’s relatable and personal and people wanted to not only support an important cause, but to show Colleen and her family that they support them in their journey as well."
Now aged 17, Chapman’s son is still connected to the friends he made at The Shepherd Centre. In the last year, he’s also taken an online cooking class through the Hear For You program and aspires to be a chef.
Scott believes that Chapman and her son are incredible examples of the impact The Shepherd Centre can make. "We are so grateful to Colleen and QBE. This grant is going to help so many children reach their full potential, just like Colleen’s son. It means they can have an equal voice."
Find out more about The Shepherd Centre
Learn more about the QBE Foundation
