60% of under-18s more likely to vote after taking part in HeadsUp

A detailed evaluation exercise of the Hansard Society’s HeadsUp innovative website for young people demonstrates a proven way to get young people interested in politics and involved in political debate.

The HeadsUp Evaluation Report [PDF, 313KB] is available be download.

Key evaluation findings are:

• 60% of young people said they more likely to vote after taking part in HeadsUp
• 92% of teachers rated HeadsUp excellent or said they would use it again
• Debate findings from HeadsUp were quoted in Commons’ debate
• Comments from participating MPs include ‘an excellent resource which is not only informative, but encourages active debate’; ‘the standard of debate and discussion was very high’ and ‘The HeadsUp report is very encouraging; it shows how much young people are interested and keen to participate in addressing the issues’
• HeadsUp gives less confident youngsters in class the chance to have their say
• Since 2003, the number of legislators has increased significantly. For example, in the last 10 debates 86 legislators have participated. There has been a consistent involvement of high-profile Ministers
  

HeadsUp (www.HeadsUp.org.uk) is a unique, ground-breaking website where under-18s debate political issues and processes. The site is a non-partisan, cross-party educational resource that provides a secure, structured and student-centred discussion platform. The site is particularly useful in delivering the Citizenship curriculum and recent forums have seen comment from several Secretaries of State and their Shadow counterparts.

Barry Griffiths, HeadsUp Manager, commented: ‘HeadsUp is a testament to the young people, teachers and legislators who use the resource on a regular basis as the site has been running since 2003. There are many requests made upon young people’s time and the fact that they continue to use HeadsUp highlights its attraction to young people across the country interested in having their say on topical issues.’

The HeadsUp evaluation report looked at the period September 2006 – August 2007. It examined the website’s design and ease of use; how students responded to the debate topics and the role of decision-makers on the site; how useful teachers found the site; and the views of MPs and other decision-makers who took part in the forum debates over the year.

For more information contact Virginia Gibbons, Communications Manager at the Hansard Society on 0207 438 1225 or 07812 765 552.

Editors’ Notes

• HeadsUp is a vital resource for teaching the political literacy element of the Citizenship Curriculum and ensuring young people's voices are heard by decision-makers. In addition to the forum where school students explore and debate the political issues and ideas that matter to them, there are teachers' notes, ideas for classroom activities and background information for young people all available on the HeadsUp website.
• HeadsUp was launched in June 2003 as a resource to promote political awareness and participation amongst young people under the age of 18. The site assists teachers in covering the political literacy strand of citizenship education and MPs can use it to consult with their younger constituents. The site is co-funded by the Ministry of Justice (former DCA) and the House of Commons.
• The main feature of HeadsUp is a moderated online forum, where students deliberate on topical issues that relate to work in Parliament amongst themselves and with parliamentarians. The forum is supported by relevant background information and reference material – for both young people and educators. There are now two ways to register to participate in HeadsUp:
• Young People – If you are under 18 and want to get involved you need to email us at info@headsup.org.uk.  We will then email you back with your unique         username and password. Once you’re registered you can take part wherever and whenever you want.  
• Teachers – can register a whole class/school year/group by completing our online registration form.
• All HeadsUp forums are open to all to view and follow the debate. This will benefit many young people, teachers and parliamentarians as they will now be able to ‘try before they buy’ and observe the dynamic of the debates without being registered. Participants will still need to register or login to post comments.