Miniature Aussie Shepherd puppy, deaf

Question
I'm babysitting a 13 week old female aussie shepherd puppy.  She's supposedly only going to be 20-25 pounds, so her owner says.  The dog doesn't seem to hear and I indicated so to the owners.  Now, they have confirmed she's somewhat deaf and may hear tones.  The puppy doesn't even respond to a high pitched whistle.

Question:  is this common with this breed?  She's got beautiful blue eyes and a pinkish nose.  Can this situation be corrected with surgery?

Thank you!

Answer
This is all too common in the breed, sadly, and is usually the result of two merle colored dogs being mated together.  Responsible breeders will hardly ever take the chance on a merle to merle match.  It cannot be corrected surgically to the best of my knowledge, but I train many deaf dogs, so the owner, if inclined, should be able to do the same.  This site has lots of good information on training and managing the deaf dog: http://www.deafdogs.org/
By the way, the Aussie standard has no size limitation, and many Aussie enthusiasts don't think very much of trying to shrink the breed...