ALL-PARTY PARLIAMENTARY GROUP ON POLITICAL & MEDIA LITERACY
The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Political and Media Literacy provides an all-party forum to discuss the current provision of citizenship, political, and media literacy education (in schools, further and higher education) and to explore how best to further strengthen such education so that young people, regardless of their background, can play an informed and active role in our society and democracy.
The key aim of this APPG is to provide evidence for the importance of political and media literacy education in promoting youth participation in democratic life and cultivating a generation of discerning consumers of media who are resilient to misinformation. The ultimate goal of this APPG is to ensure that all young people become politically and media literate by the time they finish their secondary education.
The secretariat is Shout Out UK.
The APPG seeks to realise its key goal by supporting a mandate to:
(a) Provide every child with a minimum entitlement of political and media literacy in school by, in the first instance, resourcing and monitoring existing requirements to teach such education (including the role of teach training) at Key Stages 3 and 4 in England and through alternative routes in other constituent nations of the UK.
(b) Explore the potential for new and/or improved qualifications related to political and media literacy, including the possibility to enhance provision through a GCSE, EPQ, BTEC etc as examples.
(c) Strengthen the profile of political and media literacy in schools by incentivising educational authorities and system leaders to raise the status of political and media education in the curriculum, as well as driving the increased uptake of related qualifications within existing assessment and classification metrics.
(d) Enhance and conduct research to provide evidence for the links between political and media literacy education and active, informed, and resilient citizens, as well as explore the best ways to deliver on the goal of ensuring all young people receive a political literacy education.
The group will explore and discuss a wide range of strategic measures, ideas and interventions to strengthen provision for and teaching of political and media literacy in schools. To ensure that the curriculum meets young people’s needs and wants, we would like to ensure that political and media literacy is ingrained in all future democratic, safety and youth initiatives, in order to build a healthy democracy.
The Missing Link Report
In 2021, Shout Out UK and Dr James Weinberg released a report titled ‘The Missing Link’, which examined the state of democratic education (i.e. the teaching of politics and political literacy in all forms) in English schools. The report concludes that democratic education exists as a peripheral feature of secondary education in England and is being delivered by non-specialists who neither feel prepared to teach it nor favour appropriate pedagogic practices.
Previous Meetings & Projects
APPG Minutes
- Minutes – 12th (Annual General) Meeting held on 19.03.2024
- Minutes – 11th Meeting held on 12.12.2023
- Minutes – 10th Meeting held on 17.10.2023
- Minutes – 9th (Annual General) Meeting held on 24.04.23
- Minutes – 8th Meeting held on 13.03.23
- Minutes – 7th Meeting held on 05.12.22
- Minutes – 6th Meeting held on 17.05.2022
- Minutes – 5th (Annual General) Meeting held on 08.02.2022
- Minutes – 4th Meeting held on 04.11.2021
- Minute – 3rd Meeting held on 14.09.2021
- Minutes – 2nd Meeting held on 13.05.2021
- Minutes – Inaugural Meeting on 19.01.2021
In The News
- Push to ensure pupils are ‘politically literate’ – BBC
- Kim Leadbeater MP on BBC Breakfast – BBC
- Political literacy: why county MP Cat Smith says schools should be teaching it. – Lancashire Post
- Political Studies Association welcomes a new appg on political literacy – PSA
- Two parallel but disconnected tracks: Bridging media literacy and citizenship education – LSC
- A new survey on the teaching of political literacy warns that the gap in England’s education system threatens to undermine democracy – Independent Education Today
House of Commons & Lords Members
- Allison Gardner MP
- Baroness Beverley Hughes
- Baroness Estelle Morris
- Claire Hazelgrove MP
- Darren Paffey MP
- Ellie Chowns MP
- Irene Campbell MP
- Jess Asato MP
- Jonathan Hinder MP
- Julie Minns MP
- Kirith Entwistle MP
- Lord Andrew Lansley
- Lord Bird
- Lord Clement Jones
- Lord Knight
- Maya Ellis MP
- Monica Harding MP
- Neil Duncan-Jordan MP
- Phil Brickell MP
- Ruth Jones MP
- Sharon Hodgson MP
- Uma Kumaran MP
- Vicki Slade MP
Academic Advisory Group
- Dr. James Weinberg, AAG lead
- Prof. Matthew Flinders, Sheffield University - Principal Special Adviser
- Prof. Toby James, University of East Anglia - Fellow on Electoral Registration and Administration
- Dr Andrew Mycock, University of Huddersfield, Trustee of the Political Studies Association
- Prof. Angie Wilson, President of Political Studies Association (PSA)
- Prof. Rachel Gibson, Professor of Political Science at the University of Manchester
- Dr Ariadna Tsenina, Research Associate at the University of Manchester
- Dr Marina Cino Pagliarello, London School of Economics and Research Director for the project ‘Civic Education and Populism’/89Initiative
- Prof. James Sloam, Royal Holloway, University of London
- Dr. Cormac Mac Amhlaigh, Senior Lecturer in Public Law at the University of Edinburgh Political Studies Association (PSA)
- Dr Arlene Holmes-Henderson, Senior Research Fellow, Speaking Citizens project, University of Sussex
- Dr Christine Huebner, Nottingham Trent University, Political Studies Association Young People’s Politics Specialist Group
- Dr Ali Bhagat, The University of Manchester
- Dr Edda Sant, Manchester Metropolitan University
- Professor Bryony Hoskins, University of Roehampton
- Dr Jan Eichhorn, University of Edinburgh & d|part
- Dr Deborah Ralls, Leverhulme Early Career Research Fellow, School of Education, Communication and Language Sciences. The University of Newcastle.
- Dr Sandra Obradović, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, The Open University
Disclaimer:
This is not an official website [or feed] of the House of Commons or the House of Lords. It has not been approved by either House or its committees. All-Party Parliamentary Groups are informal groups of Members of both Houses with a common interest in particular issues. The views expressed in these webpages are those of the group.