Students Engage in Deliberative Mini Publics

A project to engage students in Dialogue of Democratic Engagement has earned the University of Victoria (UVic) international recognition from the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) Canada.

IAP2 Canada is the country’s preeminent organization dedicated to promoting, supporting and improving the practice of Public Participation. The annual Core Values Awards honour significant achievements in Public Participation, recognizing innovative projects, Indigenous engagement and work towards inclusivity. The Core Values Award received by UVic is due to taking the opportunity to pilot the use of a new technique for involving students in university decision-making: deliberative mini-publics. These forums are unique in that they use civic lotteries to bring together a descriptively representative group of the population who can then learn and deliberate together about a specific topic.

The Honourable Janet Austin, Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia and Government House supported the co-creation of positive outcomes that stemmed from this project. Outcomes included armoring students with knowledge and inspiration to become more active and engaged citizens in their communities and among their peers. The Dialogue from this project also revealed new opportunities for UVic to meaningfully engage students and community. The deliberative engagement approach successfully helped invite and involve a group representative of the diverse fabric of UVic.

Student participant, Jennifer Ramirez-Belancur, looks forward to practicing her civic engagement skills in the community