Cochlear scholarship to encourage would-be tertiary students

Bionic ear company Cochlear has set up a scholarship to encourage recipients of its cochlear implants to go on to tertiary education.

The Graeme Clark Cochlear Scholarship, named after the technology's inventor, is open to all prospective university students in the Asia-Pacific region who have Cochlear Nucleus implants, and provides financial assistance towards the cost of a minimum three-year undergraduate degree at an accredited university.

"It's not the total cost but it's a useful amount and it's ongoing over the course of their degree," said Cochlear CFO Neville Mitchell.

It is now 20 years since Prof Clark implanted Graham Carrick with his unique multi-channel cochlear implant. Since then, more than 21,000 children have received implants around the world.

Clark said that in clinical studies, young children with the cochlear implants had a similar rate of language development to children with normal hearing.

"This provides children with cochlear implants an opportunity to participate in mainstream education and to reach their full potential," he said.

"The first crop of children [who received the Nucleus implants] are just getting to university level," said Mitchell. "It's really wonderful when you think they've gone to mainstream schools and are now going to university."

The first recipient of the scholarship was Holly McDonnell, who received her implant in 1987 at the age of four -- the youngest recipient of a cochlear implant at that time. She is studying Law and Economics at the University of Sydney.

Similar scholarships have also been established in America and Europe. More information can be obtained from Cochlear's website, www.cochlear.com