The ‘Changemakers’ research project, led by Dr Donna Smith, explores improving young adults' understanding of making political and social change, using Wales as a case study. The project aims to develop educational resource(s) to improve understanding, engendering active citizenship.

The project is funded by The Open University’s ‘Open Societal Challenges’ programme.

What is Changemakers?

This project will explore the societal challenge of young adults’ understanding of how to make political and social change in the UK as active citizens, and how this can be positively impacted through the research, development, piloting and evaluation of interventions post-secondary/compulsory education, using Wales as a case study.

As research shows that young people are more likely to be dissatisfied with democracy and less likely to participate in formal politics, this project will help policymakers and educators learn about cost-effective ways to increase understanding of and participation in politics of young adults, which will increase societal cohesion and civic engagement, and enable more representative decision-making. More broadly, the project will enable young adults to better understand how they can become ‘active citizens’ (i.e. active political citizens, actively trying to make change or indeed prevent it).

Banner image: "Ceiling, roof" by AlexDMartin is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.