Media literacy intermediaries

Despite the rapid growth in media technology uptake and use over the past ten years, media literacy education in Australia has been offered in ad hoc and disparate ways. For school-aged children there is a national curriculum. Research highlights that the quality and delivery is neither consistent nor effective. As for the adult population, we lack a national policy or strategy. Where there is support, the main focus has been on mitigating online abuses and scams, or on developing a defined set of technology skills. The importance of informal networks and intermediaries have been found in many studies, mainly from digital inclusion studies (Diaz et al, 2009; Powell et al, 2010; Park, 2014). However, there are very few empirical studies on how intermediaries and informal networks can effectively deliver media literacy programs and more importantly, very little is known about those who serve as intermediaries, their attitudes, needs and perspectives about their impact and influence.

UC will work with the Collaborating Party to investigate the possibility of including additional partners – media arts teachers associations, cultural institutions, community centres – as well as scaling up the research to be more representative of all Australians. The interviews will serve as an evaluation of the protocol that was developed.