Vocational Student of the Year - Victoria

The 2018 Victorian Vocational Student of the year is Elise Stewart.  Elise demonstrates that having a disability shouldn’t prevent anyone from achieving their goals. Initially Elise was told she couldn’t become a nurse because she is profoundly deaf and could put patients at risk.

Through resilience and determination, she became the first deaf person to complete a Diploma of Nursing at Bendigo TAFE. 

To accomplish this Elise accessed full-time interpreters, lobbied to have electronic materials subtitled, and worked with an audiologist to have equipment amplified so she could hear bodily sounds. Elise’s inspiring work helped to break down the communication barriers for teachers, peers and patients, and her current workplace now has deafness awareness training.

Elise will go on to represent Victoria at the Australian Training Awards 

Source: https://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/awards/vta/Pages/vtawinners2018.aspx