UNSW        University of Sydney        Bond University

The history of this project…

2002. Early in 2002, a group of retirement village operators from the Central Coast of New South Wales were discussing the challenges facing the Australian retirement village industry. One of the things they were most concerned about was the lack of independent, factual information about the industry, particularly as it related to its economic benefits.

Mr. Patrick Wilde, Executive Chairman of the Henry Kendall Group, volunteered to broach the topic with Dr. Dave Kennedy (then at the University of New South Wales), a well-regarded academic who was familiar with the retirement village and aged care industries.  Dave recommended that the research project take the form of an Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage Grant. If the grant application was successful, the financial support of the ARC, as well as a number of major universities, would enhance the quality and credibility of the project, as well as its financial reach. He also suggested broadening the research into a “triple-bottom line analysis” that, in addition to examining the economic benefits of retirement community living, would also examine its environmental as well as social-psychological benefits. Related, he encouraged a truly “national” project encompassing all states and territories, all types of residential tenure, all socio-economic levels, and not-for-profit as well as for-profit communities.

2003. Dave and Pat set about recruiting supporters for the grant application. They knew they would need a number of academic researchers to conduct the independent research, as well as a number of industry partners to join with the ARC to jointly fund it. Numerous meetings were held with academics, industry leaders, and staff from UNSW’s Research Office to discuss the viability of the grant application.

2004. By mid-2004, 3 professors had been recruited to lead the 3 research teams that would conduct this triple-pronged project. Professor John Piggott of UNSW would lead the Economic Team. Professor Philip Bohle of UNSW would lead the Social-psychological Team, and Professor George Earl, then with UNSW, would lead the Built Environment Team. Related, an impressive list of industry sponsors, representing all aspects of the Australian retirement village industry, had agreed to support the grant application, some as cash sponsors, some as in-kind sponsors, and some as both.

The ARC Linkage Grant application “Economic, environmental and social psychological evaluation of senior living alternatives in Australia” was lodged with the ARC in April of 2004, with a request for three years worth of funding, beginning in 2005. The application was assessed by the ARC reviewers and returned to the research team for refinement. Subsequently, a rejoinder was submitted to the ARC by the principal investigators in July of 2004.

In November of 2004, the Hon Dr Brendan Nelson MP, Minister for Education, Science and Training, wrote Dr Kennedy informing him that the application was successful and that, subject to parliamentary appropriation, the research project would be awarded indicative funding of $412,000 over the 3-year period of 2005-2007. Combined with the cash pledged by the industry sponsors, the cash value of the research project was $712,000.

2005. While the total cash value of the grant was $712,000, the original scope of the project called for approximately $900,000 in cash funds. The research team was faced with two choices: either scale the project back or raise additional funds. It was the consensus amongst both the researchers and the original sponsors that additional organizations could be recruited to make up for the budget shortfall. During 2005, 7 additional cash sponsors and one additional in-kind sponsor were added to the project. On December 13, 2005, 26 sponsors (for a full list of the sponsors, go to http://www.bond.edu.au/about/faculties/bus/arc/research-sponsors.html) signed a Collaborative Grant Agreement with UNSW to sponsor this linkage grant. In addition to the $412,000 in cash support from the ARC, the industry sponsors pledged cash of $480,000. With the value of the in-kind contributions from industry sponsors, as well as UNSW and Bond University (where Professor George Earl was now employed) the total estimated value of the project was now $1,528,231.

2006. Preliminary aspects of the project began in earnest in February 2006, after the holiday break. The key researchers began to recruit staff, recruit PhD applicants, purchase project-specific equipment, send invoices to sponsors, and begin the appropriate literature reviews. Before any funds could be released, ethics approvals had to be applied for and granted by the UNSW Human Research Ethics Approval (HREA) Panel. This approval was granted in April of 2006, and the project began in earnest. With three years of funding, the data collection and analysis was scheduled to run from January 2006 to December 2008.

2007. Early in 2007, the first outputs from the grant were sent to the sponsors in the form of three working papers. They were:

  • Contextualising retirement villages in elder residential transition: Economic and financial aspects of senior living alternatives in Australia by John Piggott and Renuka Sane.
  • Retirement village resident satisfaction in Australia: A qualitative enquiry by David Kennedy and Dominiek Coates.
  • National evaluation of retirement villages care pilot AIHW Final Report: A Commentary by David Kennedy and Rachel Scott.

The Kennedy and Coates paper was accepted for presentation at the I-CHRIE 2007 Annual Conference in Dallas, Texas. Since that time, a later version of that manuscript has been submitted for peer review at the Journal of Housing for the Elderly.

Several additional working papers will be delivered to sponsors during 2007.

In July of 2007, the administrative “home” of the research project was moved from UNSW to the University of Sydney as a result of Dr Kennedy accepting the position of Associate Professor in their Faculty of Health Sciences.

At present, the research team includes:

  • 12 academics from 3 universities (University of Sydney, University of New South Wales, Bond University)
  • 3 PhD students
  • 3 practitioners/sponsors
  • 5 research assistants
  • 1 project coordinator

It is expected that data collection will be completed by 2008. Data analysis and write-up is expected to continue through 2009.