Annual Appeal

ECU's Annual Appeal allows all members of the University community to contribute in a tangible way to its future development and seeks to encourage regular and on-going giving.

Each year, the funds raised from the Annual Appeal are directed towards priority areas for the University.

This year, our appeal focussed on Alzheimer's Disease. This disease is a devastating condition, terrifying, bewildering and heartbreaking all at once. The very thought of being affected or having it affect someone we care about, is more than most of us want to deal with. Here at ECU, we are thinking about it very seriously. At The Centre of Excellence for Alzheimer’s Disease Research and Care, we are searching for the keys to early diagnosis, prevention and treatment of this insidious disease. We’re also working to improve the care, well-being and quality of life for people with Alzheimer’s disease and those that care for them.

The Centre is unique as it brings together a multi disciplinary team of leading clinical researchers, exercise physiologists and state of the art brain imaging specialists. Your donation will help the Centre achieve the following goals and strive for a world free of Alzheimer’s:

• Contribute to the community by developing effective strategies for the prevention of Alzheimer’s disease;
• Develop tests for the early diagnosis of the disease;
• Develop effective treatments that delay the onset of the disease and reduce its progression
• Make a substantial difference in the care, well-being and quality of life for people with Alzheimer’s disease.

In 2006, our Annual Appeal focussed on two critical issues for our society - improving participation in education by Indigenous Australians and improving literacy and numeracy skills within our community.

The first half of our appeal focussed on Kurongkurl Katitjin, ECU's School of Indigenous Studies and sought funds for:

• Scholarships for non traditional courses like aviation, business, law, justice and nursing;
• Rent assistance for indigenous students from regional areas to study in Perth ;
• Research funding for projects to improve indigenous education, health, employment and training;
• Funds to establish additional regional centres (eg; Port Hedland, Carnarvon)

The Kurongkurl Katitjin appeal generated a lot of enthusiasm and support for Kurongkurl Katitjin and provided many new donors to the University the opportunity to actively participate in this worthy initiative.

The second half of this appeal focussed on ECU's Fogarty Learning Centre in order to be able to extend the capacity of the Centre in two main areas. Firstly, to extend the capacity of the Fogarty Learning Centre's School Site Literacy Coaching program - to allow more children with learning difficulties, who wouldn't otherwise have the chance to receive special tuition, the opportunity to participate in this program. Secondly, to allow more education students to undertake the clinical program at the Fogarty Learning Centre - currently the Centre only has the capacity for just 100 of its 700 education students to take part in this viatal program. This appeal will be launched in November and we encourage you to give generously to the Fogarty Learning Centre to improve the lives of so many children in our community.

If you would like to contribute to any of these appeals - please contact Fiona Allan in the Alumni and Development Office on 6304 2085 or via email: f.allan@ecu.edu.au

We thank all of our Annual Appeal donors for their generous support and hope to be able to report back soon on how the funds raised were utilised by the respective Schools and Centres.