NextSense—centre for innovation

Over our more than 160-year history, NextSense, formerly the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children, has helped redefine what’s possible for hundreds of thousands of Australians through early intervention services, specialist schooling, cochlear implant services and much more.

Today we support more than 10,000 people annually nationwide and run Australia’s largest cochlear implant program.

NextSense is there, for however long we’re needed— from a year to a lifetime.

“ I was expecting to live a silent lip-reading world for the rest of my life until I discovered the NextSense cochlear implant program—a service that gave me a hearing level that I had never experienced in my lifetime and allowed me to keep my career as a childcare worker.”

—Christine, cochlear implant recipient

Throughout the years

1869

Specialist services expand to offer the same lifechanging support to children who are blind.

1959

The Board of Directors purchases land at North Rocks and commences building.

1965

Partnering with the Department of Education, RIDBC provides the first early intervention service for deaf and blind children in the Southern Hemisphere.

1860

Thomas Pattison, a deaf migrant to Australia from Scotland, establishes the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children (RIDBC) in 1860.

1908

Alice Betteridge enrols as a student. She is the first deafblind child to receive an education in Australia.

1963

The Governor of NSW, Sir Eric Woodward, officially opens the RIDBC North Rocks premises.

1978

The first computerised braille production unit in the world is established on-site to produce braille materials for people who are blind or have low vision, a service that continues today.

1989

An Australian first reverseintegration preschool opens for children who are deaf or hard of hearing and their hearing peers.

2007

Remote services commence, providing vital support for children and families in rural and regional areas across Australia.

2014

NextSense launches the world’s first online braille training program, Unified English Braille (UEB) Online, which has provided nearly 30,000 people from 130 different countries with quality training in UEB literacy and mathematics.

2023

NextSense at Macquarie University will open, providing best-practice teaching, services, specialist professional education and advocacy. The centre will be the first of its kind in Australia.

1993

The Thomas Pattison Annexe opens. Here, students from kindergarten to Year 10 are taught in both Australian sign language (Auslan) and English.

2014

NextSense merges with the Sydney Cochlear Implant Centre to create Australia’s largest and most comprehensive cochlear implant program.

2019

A significant milestone, with 10,000 adults, children, and professionals accessing our services.

A growing problem

Hearing and vision

loss are not new. But both are increasing—and their impact is high. By 2030, nearly 5 million Australians are expected to have hearing loss and more than 1 million people will be blind or have low vision.

Children’s language development, education and psychological development are at risk.

And for adults, not addressing hearing and vision loss is connected to loneliness and social isolation, poorer mental health, risks of falls and dementia, and the inability to work and live independently.

Importantly, hearing and vision loss disproportionately affect Indigenous Australians.

Left unaddressed, this will affect lives in profound ways. It will affect society too.

A new era for hearing and vision loss

NextSense is embarking on a bold new future that builds on our rich history of innovation and advocacy for those with hearing and vision loss.

We’ve positively impacted many people’s lives, creating access and opportunities that would not otherwise have been possible.

The time has now come when we must raise the bar for what’s possible for people with hearing and vision loss. We must improve access to the right support for the increasing number of Australians with sensory disability. We must connect our rich expertise with what we learn from others to build insights that drive real change for the people we support.

Education and services for people with sensory disability have changed dramatically over the years.

From a time when attending specialist programs in person was the only option available, to now delivering community-relevant programs, we are bringing our services into the communities we support.

We, like many other areas of contemporary society, have learned so much about how to work with and alongside those who we support.

We’ve evolved so much during our history, and in doing so have continued to improve outcomes for people with hearing and vision loss. But our North Rocks home hasn’t grown with us to support a contemporary service organisation.

Our home at North Rocks has served us well, but we need a modern, agile centre that brings people together, creating more opportunities for them to do innovative work, and to share knowledge throughout communities across Australia. We need a centre that helps us build and expand powerful partnerships to solve big issues in hearing and vision loss. We need to take what we know—from our own and others’ research and development, and from our own deep experience delivering health, disability and education services—and test new ideas at scale.

The future looks dramatically different, in the most positive of ways. We will be able to reach people in their own communities, Australia-wide.

We are moving from our home in North Rocks.

An innovative, centralised hub

Northern Territory

Educators will have access to virtual training based on the latest research and knowledge, to further integrate children with sensory disability into the classroom so they learn alongside their peers.

Our new centre will serve as a central hub for the work of NextSense—hearing and vision services, education, research, professional training, and advocacy—that will change the future of people with sensory disability Australia-wide.

Tasmania

Older adults will be able to access cochlear implant services and hear their grandchildren laughing in the back garden.

Far North Queensland

Children will receive virtual training with their physical braille textbooks, removing barriers that previously existed.

NextSense centre at Macquarie University

Sydney, NSW

With a physical location at the heart, the centre will allow for exponential reach of our services, beyond our more than 20 physical locations Australia-wide.

These are just a few examples of what the new centre at Macquarie University will make possible, when the right people, programs and organisations are brought together to share knowledge with exponential reach.

When it came to my exams, my NextSense vision teacher Pam made sure I had access to the right supports. Small things like exam paper colour, using beige instead of white, for example, can make a big difference—it was much easier for me to see...

Beyond the study support, Pam was a great emotional support—helping me get back on track and focus on my goals.”

Joseph, student in our School Support Services program

Real life impacts

Evidence shows that if we focus on early intervention for children, and appropriate support for older adults, negative impacts can be largely prevented and overcome.

A 5-year-old girl who is deaf has every possibility of reaching the same education milestones as a hearing child.

A 75-year-old grandparent with hearing loss can

stay connected

to family and friends, stay physically and mentally strong and enjoy independence as they age.

A 10-year-old girl who has low vision can access the school curriculum alongside her peers with access to and knowledge of technology tools and support

Now my heart explodes with joy when I see Valentina turn and respond to soft sounds that I never thought she would be able to hear.

NextSense helped me and my family understand that there is so much opportunity and potential for our little girl…”

Kiara, mum of Valentina, who was born with profound hearing loss in both ears.

“

1 in 6 Australians have hearing loss.

Hearing loss costs

Australia $41.2 billion annually—including health system and financial costs, productivity losses and a reduction in wellbeing.

vision.

1 in 40 are blind or have low

58% of Australians with vision loss are unemployed, not by choice but due to negative employer perceptions towards hiring persons with disability.

Every $1 invested in hearing health in the western pacific region will return a $25 gain.

Hearing loss is the number one modifiable risk for dementia in middle age and has a measurable impact on employability, quality of life and independence.

— Rosalie, mum of Cherraya, who at age two was the first Indigenous toddler to receive a cochlear implant in the Northern Territory.

“ Cherraya responded to the sound immediately and I cried from happiness. I’ll never forget it. Not having to go to a bigger city, being able to stay here [in Darwin] with the entire family has been great.”

Improving access and opportunity

Our new centre for innovation will build on work already done to improve access to the right supports for people of all ages with hearing and vision loss across Australia.

It will:

Provide more highly trained professionals including teachers, speech pathologists, early intervention specialists, and audiologists to work with people with hearing and vision loss and their families

DEVELOPED DESIGN

ZONE 1: INVITED THERAPY SPACES

Offer better knowledge of what works to make services accessible to all

Furniture & Joinery

Combine research strength with real-world experience and bring the right people together, in one ecosystem.

Bench with sink & storage below Wall mounted hand sanitising station

Desk for staff use, with ergonomic task chair

4 door full height storage

Square table, rounded corners, height adjustable, four legs

Kids and adults chairs

Tripp trapp chair

Saddle chair

Therapy rooms

THERAPY ROOM TYPE 1 LG.28

THERAPY ROOM TYPE 2 LG.29

THERAPY ROOM TYPE 1 LG.30

THERAPY ROOM TYPE 2 LG.31

THERAPY ROOM TYPE 1 LG.32

THERAPY ROOM TYPE 1 LG.33

A centre for all

The new centre for innovation will host multiple therapy rooms, audiometric testing booths, assessment rooms, sensory spaces, and accessible and engaging classroom spaces for all clients. It will be a collaboration and innovation space for our people and our partners.

Ground floor First floor

See how we can do more for people with hearing and vision loss

“Addressing the growing challenge of supporting more and more people with hearing and vision loss can only be done if we bring the best minds together. Building an ecosystem with like-minded organisations draws on our collective strength across the research, technology, not-forprofit, government and services sectors, and is critical to driving this forward.

ur new centre at Macquarie University is how we can all, together, meet the growing demand.”

—Chris Rehn, NextSense Chief Executive

Housed alongside our industry leaders

The new NextSense centre at Macquarie University is an important opportunity to expand and refine services, and build new knowledge and ways of working to benefit even more people with hearing and vision loss.

We’ll work alongside leaders at the Australian Hearing Hub, Macquarie University and Cochlear Limited, expand our connections with education experts and collaborate with leading thinkers in other academic disciplines.

As a leading service provider, we can put a fresh lens on research, increasing its ability to transform people’s lives.

It will also keep us at the forefront of delivering best-practice services and educational excellence that we can share with the global community.

The new centre, from day one, means NextSense can:

Increase the number of people with hearing or vision loss we work with each year, with the space and resources to scale-up our services

Allow for more children to access life-changing early intervention services

Open more pathways to cochlear implants for adults who need them, strengthening the pre- and post-surgery rehabilitation care models

Extend the reach of our nationwide telehealth capacity so more people can receive this critical support each year

Attract the brightest talent of skilled clinicians, allied health professionals and researchers to advance our practice

Create a unique physical environment with the cutting-edge facilities our clients deserve.

A $75 million transformation

$25 million is projected to be received from State and Federal Governments, with $12.5 million already committed by the Federal Government.

The NextSense centre at Macquarie University will require a financial investment of $75 million.

$25 million

from the sale of our North Rocks location will be directed to the new centre.

$25 million will be sought from the generosity of supporters —with this figure as a minimum fundraising goal. Our aim is to exceed this figure in philanthropic support, to drive an even greater impact.

We recognise the challenge ahead— of ensuring that everyone who works with children and adults with hearing and vision loss provides the most effective services in the most effective way.

We’ve never strayed away from challenges. Right now is no different.

The NextSense centre at Macquarie University meets this challenge—for now and for many years to come.