Social Community Case Studies

Diversity in Westfield’s Workplace
Developing Leaders and Managers
Measuring Employee Engagement
Biometric Security at Westfield Shopping Centres
Stratford City
Strategic Partnering in Australian Communities
A National Campaign — Give Back to School

Case Study 

Strategic Partnering in Australian Communities

Background

The Westfield Community Program was established in 2008 to provide support to children living with disabilities and their families. The program directs funds for therapy, equipment, respite programs that provide time out for families/carers, early intervention programs to deliver early diagnosis and treatment to young children and programs to inform and educate families and the community.

Westfield centres and head office divisions partner with a local children’s disability service provider, giving all staff as well as retailers and customers the opportunity to make a difference to families in their own local community. Westfield staff helps raise awareness of the charity in the community, raise funds through in-centre activities and participation in fundraising events and donate funds through a workplace giving program. The Group has encouraged staff participation by providing a paid employee volunteer program and dollar-matching all Workplace Giving donations. 

Westfield continues to support more than 30 not-for-profit organisations across Australia and in 2011, over $1 million was provided to charities across Australia through the Westfield Community Program, primarily to assist children with disabilities. 

Community engagement in action

The Shepherd Centre is one of only a few organisations in Australia to provide access to a specialised family-centred, multidisciplinary early intervention and paediatric cochlear implant program for families with children aged from 0 to 5 years who are deaf or have a hearing loss. The Centre’s mission is to help deaf children to achieve the best possible listening and spoken language they are capable of, through a multi-disciplinary program that includes the provision of cochlear implants, specialised Auditory Verbal therapy, and child and family counselling. 

The Shepherd Centre is the charity partner of Westfield Chatswood and Westfield Liverpool and the shopping centre teams work closely with the local branches of The Shepherd Centre in Roseville and Casula.

A key program at The Shepherd Centre is the Early Intervention residential workshops. These form the only outreach program of its kind in Australia, providing educational and practical information to families, carers and teachers of children that are deaf or hearing-impaired. The workshops are focused on training and empowering the parents and/or carers to be the main teacher for their child using the strategies of Auditory Verbal therapy where children attend intensive individual listening and spoken language therapy sessions to help them develop spoken language.

The workshops provide families, carers and teachers with intensive, inspirational and fun days of education, therapy and support. Throughout the course of the workshop each family receives:

  • information sessions from expert speakers including The Shepherd Centre’s audiologist, auditory-verbal therapist, and child and family counsellor and past students of The Shepherd Centre
  • excursions with other families on the program to learn listening and language skills in everyday environments
  • speech and language assessments 
  • audiology and Auditory-Verbal therapy sessions 
  • language groups
  • childcare and children’s entertainment during parent lectures and family support meetings
  • follow-up support

The Early Intervention residential workshops in 2011 were funded through the Westfield Community Program in Sydney, Bateman’s Bay, Terrigal and Maitland. The centre teams helped to raise awareness of The Shepherd Centre in the local community, volunteer their time and raise funds to help provide much needed equipment and programs.

The residential workshops had a great response from families living in rural and remote areas, with 47 children, 26 siblings and their parents attending the workshops held in Bateman’s Bay, Terrigal and Maitland. They benefited from individual targeted therapy sessions and group sessions including external speakers and past parents inspiring the families and empowering them to look beyond the hardship of raising a child living with a disability.

The 2011 graduation outcomes for children with no additional disability and for whom English is a first language show that over 90% of the children were able to enter mainstream school with ‘age-appropriate language’ skills. 

Shepherd Centre — Photo courtesy of The Shepherd Centre