ACTION TODAY FOR A BETTER TOMORROW
THE FUTURE OF INTERGENERATIONAL LIVING AND LEARNING A new model combining senior living with school campuses has attracted $1.1m in government funding.
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istorically, aged care and the education of young people have existed at two ends of the social policy spectrum. Now a new model of living is set to turn this traditional thinking on its head.
“Since the industrial revolution, our approach as a community has been to manage older people and schoolaged children as separate silos, both physically and in every other way,” said Director of Fulton Trotter Architects Mark Trotter. “Yet these two demographic groups have much to offer one another, and by facilitating interaction and integration we can help solve many issues. “Effectively the potential exists to combine senior living with schools or schooling, from early retirement through to later life.” This is a concept that Mark has been considering for many years, based on observations during his lifelong career as an architect. Recently, he teamed up with Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and the Australian Catholic University (ACU) to come up with a practical way forward, and was pleased to find an enormous amount of support from the government and private sector as well. “QUT suggested that we jointly put together a research proposal to the NHMRC Ideas Grant Scheme, because this idea is much more than architecture, it’s about behavioural science, allied health and economics as well. “ACU also came on board, and in December we were successful in securing a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) grant, which all collaborators were thrilled about. “The government support is timely, because what we are trying to do is revolutionise the way we look after older
Mark Trotter, the man behind a new model for intergenerational living.
people and break down misunderstandings around ageing in our society. “We’ve also had a lot of interest from the private sector, and some local schools have expressed interest in the concept, which shows what we are doing has merit.” The $1.1m grant will support research conducted by four PhD students (two from QUT and two from ACU) over a period of five years, who will study various aspects of the Continued on page 42
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