Articles & Case Studies

Articles & Case Studies

 The Office of the Protective Commissioner and the Office of the Public Guardian is staffed by 330 people who

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k after the financial and personal affairs of people who are unable to make decisions on their own behalf. Both organisations face significant challenges including;



  • Restructures in both

  • Increasing demand for service

  • Moving offices across the whole organisation

  • Consequent loss of skilled staff

  • Engagement of new staff

  • Complex work often involving families in conflict


At the end of 2007 the Commissioner invited staff to form a festive season choir and 20 staff formed the inaugural choir including people with trained voices, others who had sung in the school choir and people who believed they were tone deaf! With the support of a professional singing teacher the choir first sang for and end-of-year afternoon tea and the performance was a resounding success. The choir decided that they wanted to continue to sing as a group and later we extended membership to all business centres of Attorney Generals Department located at Parramatta. While not designed to be a performance choir they will have performed a further four times by the holiday break – all within the broader Department.


"From my perspective, the choir has provided an invaluable platform for cross and intra-organisational understanding, is a great team building activity and has also been beneficial to singers with all levels of experience. People who previously communicated via e-mail have met each other on a different playing field and the positive effect has translated back to their daily work.


Staff who have not joined the choir remain great supporters and frequently ask members about the choir and when we are performing next. It has become a marker point in the week for all members. It takes only an hour, but that hour is a respite from our demanding and stressful jobs when we immerse ourselves in an activity that is different, energising, a team endeavour, mentally stimulating and just downright fun." Imelda Dodds, Protective Commissioner and Public Guardian


Music Builds Bridges in the Brain
ScienceNOW Daily News, April 16, 2008


Harvard Medical School and Boston College researchers have found that taking music lessons can strengthen connections between the two hemispheres of the brain in children, but only if

they practice diligently.
For the children who practiced at least 2.5 hours a week, a region of the corpus callosum that connects movement-planning regions on the two sides of the brain grew about 25% relative to the size of the brain.
With every child, the researchers found that the size increase in the corpus callosum predicted the improvement on a nonmusical test that required the children to tap out sequences on a computer keyboard.


"Creativity has become the most universally endangered species in the Twenty First Century. Never has the need for creativity been so compelling and never has genuine creativity been in such short supply. From boy bands to barbeque sauces the problem is the same – instead of experiencing the refreshing spray of authentic originals we risk drowning in a sea of superficiality and imitations. We have built a broadband culture but not the creative content to supply it. Our ability to communicate the potentially creative far outstrips actual creative input. In the absence of creativity life becomes predictable, repetitious and boring. We live in a world of echoes and shadows like the inhabitants of Plato’s cave." Watts Wacker and Ryan Matthews



To read some of the research on this topic, please select one of the below articles:



Canterbury Christ Church University - Sidney de Haan Research Centre for Arts and Health Research Project Outcomes



  1. Singing and Health: Summary of a Systematic Mapping and Review of Non-Clinical Research - Professor Stephen Clift, Grenville Hancox, Rosalia Staricoff and Christine Whitmore
    PDF 1.4mb

  2. The Silver Song Club Project: Summary of a Formative Evaluation - Hilary Bungay and Ann Skingley
    PDF 1.6mb

  3. Choral Singing, Wellbeing and Health: Summary of Findings from a Cross-national Survey - Stephen Clift, Grenville Hancox, Ian Morrison, Bärbel Hess, Don Stewart and Gunter Kreutz
    PDF 1.9mb


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