Hear For You utilises the services of approximately 23 volunteers including the mentors, Chief J. Brabon (The Original Bootcamp), Donald de Boer (Audit), DBC Associates (Accounting), Kate Locke (Networking Adviser), Jo Doyle (Marketing Adviser), Kate Hack (PR/Publicity Officer), Lucy Bradstreet (Events Assistant), Eve Mayes (Drama Coach), and Alison Herridge (Workshop Content Adviser).
We would like to express great appreciation to these people for their generosity and contribution to Hear For You.
Chief J. Brabon
Chief (James) Brabon, runs Boot Camp activities in conjunction with Hear For You’s Leadership and Teamwork workshops. Chief is Founder and Global Master Trainer for ORIGINAL BOOTCAMP International. The pioneer of Boot Camp training here in Australia, Chief has become one of the countries’ most recognised and respected fitness personalities. A former Australian Army Infantry soldier, Chief has dedicated over 15 years to providing cutting edge physical training programs to military and public safety personnel, professional athletes, celebrities and literally thousands of civilian bootcamp Recruits.
A regular contributor to both civilian and military magazines on the subject of results based functional fitness training, Chief has also appeared on over twenty Australian and International television programs, and has been featured in dozens of newspapers and magazine articles worldwide. Most recently, Chief was head hunted by Channel 7, and Endemol Australia, to head up the Physical Training Team for the 2008 series of Gladiators. He was personally charged with creating and overseeing the selection process for both Challengers and Gladiators, as well as designing the Combat Conditioning program used to prepare the Gladiators for their demanding roles.
Eve Mayes
Eve Mayes runs drama activities for the Hear For You participants. Eve is an English / English as a Second Language teacher and Year Adviser at Condell Park High School, a comprehensive state school in South West Sydney. She began her career as a Vocational Trainer for adults with a disability in the workplace: assessing, training and supporting young people in the transition from school to work.
Eve is also involved in a range of academic projects improving the literacy and engagement of young people. These projects include the University of Western Sydney's "Teachers for a Fair Go" project. Eve's class room was a case study for the analysis of what engages and improves outcomes for students from low-socioeconomic backgrounds.
Eve has presented at state and national conferences on Critical Literacy, the implementation of the new HSC English Prescriptions list and ESL pedagogy and is a facilitator for English as a Second Language professional development for teachers.
Donald de Boer
Donald de Boer is auditor of Hear For You. Principal of DBC associates, Donald commenced the practice on his own account in 1980 at the age of 26. The practice is now one of the largest of its type in Australia. Prior to commencing the practice he was with Price Waterhouse Coopers in the Audit, Corporate Services and Tax Advisory sectors.
Donald is Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, a Fellow of the Tax Agent Institute of Australia and has a Graduate Diploma in Financial Planning. He is a Registered Tax Agent and Registered Company Auditor.
Jo Doyle
Jo Doyle is a Hear For You volunteer specialising in marketing. Jo was born in South Africa into a Scottish family, raised in England and now lives in Melbourne with her husband Nick, one of the Hear For You mentors. Baby Doyle will be joining them on Boxing Day and will wear an England rugby kit whether a boy or a girl.
Jo has a degree in media studies and a post graduate qualification in marketing, with eight years of experience across diverse sectors including finance, travel and healthcare. That's why she's volunteering to help Hear For You with marketing and communications.
In her spare time Jo likes to run, swim, scuba dive, bush walk, ride her bike or do anything that doesn't involve sitting on the sofa. She loves to travel and once did so for two whole years - nowadays she tries to fit the adventures into two week slots.
Kate Hack
Kate Hack has a moderate hearing loss which went undetected until the age of five, when her family relocated to the United States.
Kate was fitted with hearing aids and attended a local elementary school in the U.S. Her family returned to Australia when she was seven. She went on to complete her HSC at a mainstream Catholic secondary girls school.
Kate was awarded a five year scholarship under the Group of Eight Scheme, which recognises students who have suffered educational disadvantages to study Bachelor of Arts, majoring in English at the University of Sydney.
Upon graduation, Kate travelled around Australia for four months, which she says has been by far the best thing she has ever done. She has worked in public relations and marketing over the past four years and last year completed a diploma in Fashion Design. Kate is now working for a sleepwear design company. Kate recently got married and regularly travels to New York, where her parents live.
Kate is an enthusiastic supporter of Hear For You and is the PR / Publicity Officer. She regrets not having anyone to look up to when going through adolescence with hearing impairment.
Naomi Malone
Born profoundly deaf, Naomi was fitted with hearing aids and for her education, attended the University of Sydney and University of Technology Sydney. Holding an Arts/Law degree and a MA in History, Naomi's work has been published in the Public History Review, which led to Naomi being awarded an Outstanding Student Award by UTS.
For 12 years until mid-2009, Naomi worked at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation as a lawyer, policy advisor and project manager, gaining an understanding of the arts industry. During that time, Naomi travelled and backpacked throughout the world extensively including living and working in the USA for six months.
After the ABC, Naomi worked as an Accessibility Producer working to make a play ‘Cohabitation: Bondi’ accessible to people with disability. Naomi was successful in raising funds to provide for technological systems that conveyed captions and audio descriptions to the hearing impaired and vision impaired patrons.
Naomi is thrilled to be serving as Fundraising Manager for Hear For You, which she enthusiastically supports.
