UA is committed to enhancing civic education and democratic engagement by leveraging academic freedom and rigorous enquiry, fostering a culture of informed and active citizenship throughout our nation.

Universities play a pivotal role in fostering civics education, engagement, and participation in Australia. Universities are not just places for career learning, skills and competencies development; universities contribute to the advancement of knowledge via the application of intellectual curiosity and rigour in research, education and community-focused activities.

Quality education, with the right policy settings, is strongly correlated with individual and national well-being and prosperity through higher employment, wealth, health, well-being and engagement and participation in civic affairs. For Australia’s universities, this correlation is important when responding to issues associated with democratic engagement. These settings include ensuring Australians, and more specifically, voters, have access to reliable and expert-informed information from trusted sources. They should also ensure that institutions of learning are appropriately equipped to deliver learning and teaching to students and that research can be undertaken that has nationwide impacts on the lives of Australians. A report by the University Partnerships Program Foundation’s Civic University Commission, published in the United Kingdom in 2019, highlighted the role of universities as institutions for civic good: “Universities have an irreplaceable and unique role in helping their host communities thrive – and their own success is bound up with the success of the  places that gave birth to them”.

In the current era, perceptions about misinformation and limited access to credible information could be hindering civic engagement. Addressing this issue is essential requires utlising institutions that provide individuals with the necessary skills to differentiate between reliable and unreliable sources of information. This is crucial for the democratic welfare of Australia, both in the present and the future.

This submission outlines some of the activities universities undertake to address civics education, engagement and participation in  Australia. It also identifies some of the challenges to civics education in Australia and what universities are doing to help overcome these issues.

Recommendations

• Support the community-focused, trusted status of Australia’s universities to appropriately engage with communities, particularly schools, in identifying how civics education and engagement can be enhanced.
• Ensuring the right policy settings are in place to facilitate innovative and responsive learning opportunities for students at all levels, from early childhood education through to tertiary education, is a necessary first step in supporting greater civic education and engagement in Australia. These policy settings include flexibility to be community responsive, are place- and mission-based and reflect the necessity of regional and community origin approaches to effective policy making.