Educating in Real Time: How to Stay Up to Date in a Dynamic Policy Environment.

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Holly Wild

As educators in public health, we are all too familiar with how unwieldy the field can be to teach. There are no neat, linear career pathways, no black-and-white answers, and not even a universally agreed-upon definition. While this ambiguity can feel overwhelming at first, students often come to appreciate the vast grey areas of public health. Like us, they find passion in its complexity, dynamism, and diversity.

Helping students reach this point means engaging with topics that are relevant to their current ecosystems. We need to align our discussions with their interests and the news cycle to drive engagement and critical thinking. It’s also essential that our graduates understand the contemporary landscape of public health and are prepared for the challenges they’ll face in their careers.

As such, our content is never static for long. There’s always a long list of updates awaiting any unit coordinator at the start of semester, especially for those of us teaching policy-based units. We also know that health policies don’t exist in isolation, they intersect with economic decisions, social dynamics, environmental regulations, and political priorities. In today’s era of global turbulence, it can be difficult to know where to focus, what to prioritise, and how to stay informed, while maintaining our sanity. This can be particularly challenging for new educators. 

So this month, the CAPHIA ECAC is focusing on strategies to stay up to date. We’ll be sharing tools, resources, and approaches that educators use to stay on top of current affairs in public health. In this months Catch up Cafe we want to hear from you, about what strategies and resources you use to keep up to date with everything Public Health.

So far in 2025 

In Australia have had one federal and numerous state elections in the last 12 months in Australia, with a couple more around the corner. All of which come with significant economic, health and social policy changes and reforms. 

The Public Health Association of Australia provides a neat round up of this year’s federal election from a Public Health Perspective. 

If you are still a little unclear on what health policy promises were made during this election cycle, The Conversation has a great Election Policy Tracker that you can search via policy areas. The Australian Medical Association also released a handy Health Policy Scorecard 

So now we have a digest of the health policy updates from this year’s federal election, below are some resources to keep you in the ‘Public Health loop’ and up to date with news, policy, research and health alerts in Australia, the Pacific and Globally. 

Australia

Government Resources  

Government health alerts,  subscriptions and newsletters are a great way to stay up-to-date with emerging health issues, and policy and research updates, you can often tailor your subscriptions to your areas of interest to ensure that you are receiving information that is relevant to you. You can follow the links below to subscribe to these.

All Australian State and Territory Health Departments also provide health alert and subscription options 

Peak Bodies & Associations 

Peak bodies and Associations are a great way to stay informed about key sector based changes, research and policy updated 

You can also follow both PHAA and AHPA on Social Media. 

Media 

News is a great way to stay up to date with the Australian political and policy landscape, but the 24 hours news cycle means it can sometimes be hard to find what you are after in the cacophony of information. The Guardian, The Conversation and The ABC have Australian Politics landing pages, to help tailor your news to your needs. 

Don’t have time to wade through the vast expanse of daily news? Get a digest straight to your inbox via Newsletters and Subscriptions. Sign up to newsletter and daily digests on topics such as Aus politics, global affairs and culture 

For Health specific news, Croakey is a great option for news on  public health, health equity, and the social determinants of health. The Conversation also has a health focused landing page.  

Podcasts are another great, easy way to stay up to date and both the ABC (Politics Now) and The Guardian (Politics Live) are daily Aus politics podcasts  The Health Report is also a great weekly podcasts that discusses recent developments in health, healthcare and research 

Australian Policy Research & Analysis 

After a more in-depth policy analysis? Independent Policy Institutes and Think Tanks such as The Grattan Institute and The Australia Institute can be a good source of policy research, analysis and discussion. 

You can also follow both on Social Media 

What’s happening in Indigenous Health and Policy 

With changes to government comes changes to the Indigenous health and policy landscape. News outlets such as ABC Indigenous and The Guardian Indigenous Australians can help keep you up to date. For a Health focus try Croakey First Nations News . Indigenous X is another great source of information and is a 100% Indigenous owned and operated media organisation.

For a more global take on Indigenous health and policy consider The Conversation’s Indigenous page.

Prefer a podcast to stay up to date? Try ABC Speaking Out  

What’s happening in the Pacific 

It’s also been a busy 12 months of elections across the pacific with numerous countries going to the polls. Stay up to date with politics in the Pacific via ABC Pacific and The Guardian Pacific. 

Prefer a podcast to stay up to date? Try ABC Pacific Beat  or ABC Politok. 

What’s happening in Global health 

Suffice to say it’s been a big year when it comes to global affairs, the below resources will help you focus down on just the health related issue. 

 

Health Policy Watch reports on the leading global health policy challenges & trends, you can sign up to their email daily digests. 

You can also sign up to The Lancet for alerts from their range of publications. The WHO and UN have a range of Newsletter subscriptions that will keep you up to date with global affairs, with both of these you can tailor your topics to get exactly what you need. 

Prefer a podcast?

  • HPP podcasts, from the Health Promotion Practice Journal, into its 5th season this podcast explores all things contemporary global Health Promotion
  • Public Health On Call, from Johns Hopkins and Bloomsburg School of Public Health is a daily podcast to keep you up to date with all things Public Health 
  • The Lancet in Conversation is a great way to stay up to date with current health research. You can choose from the range of Lancet publications, allowing you to focus down on your area of interest  

What did we miss? We would love to hear what resources you utilise to keep you up to date. Come along to our August Catch Up Cafe to share.