Community
We play an important role in Australian communities.
In some way, Telstra touches nearly every Australian, every day. We are actively involved in the communities in which we operate. We know the positive impact our business can have on community life and well-being and we encourage our people to be at the forefront of our efforts to benefit the Australian community..
Here are some examples of the work we do in the community.
The Telstra Foundation
The Telstra Foundation delivers our corporate philanthropy program. It supports a range of community projects to make positive and lasting differences to the lives of children and young people. The Telstra Foundation operates two programs:
- The Community Development Fund supports projects that help connect children and young people to their communities. It has three areas of focus: social innovation, Indigenous community development, and cyber safety
- Telstra’s Kids Fund is an employee directed program that provides grants of $1,200 to local community organisations involving the participation of a child or young person related to Telstra employees. It supports initiatives across education, sports and recreation, arts and culture and the environment
Did you know?
As a full and part-time permanent employee of Telstra, employees receive a range of Telstra Products and Services. This includes discounts on BigPond® Dial-Up & Broadband, BigPond® ISDN, ISDN Home, Mobile, PSTN Home, FOXTEL™, AUSTAR™ and at Telstra Shops.
Benefits >
Along with Intuitive Media Australia and La Trobe University, the Telstra Foundation has helped establish a protected and safe online learning community for young Australians. The active education program, SuperClubsPLUS Australia, equips children with the skills, confidence and aptitude to effectively and safely engage on the internet. Telstra employees were offered the opportunity to register their children with SuperClubsPLUS for free.
In November 2007 the Foundation announced its $750,000 support of the Abracadabra program, a unique reading, writing and learning interactive software tool that will help Indigenous primary school children improve their literacy skills. Telstra employees were offered the opportunity to volunteer as testers to assess the literacy skills of participating children and help determine the effectiveness of the program.
The Community Leadership Program provides support, encouragement and a sounding board to leaders of non-profit bodies as they help their organisations grow, while providing Telstra executives an opportunity to help create better communities.
In 2008 the Telstra Foundation Community Connection Program provided an opportunity to recognise Telstra employees’ contribution and effort in the community. The one-off program provided grants as a donation to community organisations where the Telstra employee is a board member or contributes time as a volunteer.
Volunteering
We promote and facilitate volunteering opportunities for employees to participate in activities that support the organisations, charities or community groups with which they are connected. For example:
- The Community Leadership Program is a capacity building program that links senior Telstra executives with leaders from community organisations in a mentoring relationship.
- Telstra museums – Managed by small groups of volunteers, Telstra’s historical collection consists of thousands of artefacts, photographs and documents representing the development of telecommunications in Australia over the past 150 years.
- Our Legal Services group runs its own community contribution program which includes Cyber Volunteering which provides answers to legal problems sent via email from children throughout Australia for the National Children’s and Youth Law Centre.
Community-Business partnerships
Telstra develops partnerships that help to increase social inclusion, focusing on health, employment and education. We provide much needed products, services, skills and expertise to support the work of not-for-profit, charity and community organisations. For example:
- onTrac@PeterMac. Telstra provides video and voice conferencing solutions and Next G™ wireless turbo cards to enable delivery of support and services for adolescents and young adults with cancer.
- Mobile Tracking Young People’s Experiences Program. Telstra provides mobile phones, pre-paid accounts and delivery of SMS to support the Centre for Adolescent Health in improving diagnosis and treating depression in young people.
Disaster relief
Each year Australia is hit by devastating bushfires, floods, cyclones and other natural disasters, destroying the homes and impacting the livelihoods of many Australians. Our first priority is to assist the emergency and essential service organisations with their telecommunication requirements. Our communications technicians are among the first to enter disaster affected areas to restore telecommunications services to our customers and we offer relief packages to affected customers. Volunteer and First Response Leave is also available to our employees to enable them to provide critical services for the protection of life and property.
Sponsorship
Telstra is an integral part of Australia, with our employees living and working in the communities we serve, participating in local events, supporting local initiatives and helping in times of distress and disaster.
From the coast to the bush, our sponsorship programs reflect Telstra’s community involvement and demonstrate our belief in Australian endeavor at all levels. For example:
- Telstra is extensively involved in Australian sport at all levels from increasing participation at the local community level to supporting the development of elite athletes. We currently support Swimming Australia, AFL, NRL, V8 Supercars and the Olympic and Paralympic Committees.
- The Telstra Assistance Fund provides assistance to purchase new sporting club equipment.
- The Telstra Connected Seniors™ program gives thousands of older Australians the chance to learn more about today’s technology by providing grants to eligible groups, like sports, community or social clubs, to run education workshops for their members.
- The Beach to Bush Surf Safety program travels to regional communities in Australia teaching school children surf and local water way safety.
- The Australian Ballet - one of the longest running arts sponsorships in the country, this sponsorship includes the annual Telstra Ballet Dancer Award.
Telstra’s community contribution for 2008/09 was measured by the London Benchmarking Group and valued at $65.2 million.