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ACU and VicHealth partner in youth-led fight against vaping

Vaping’s ruinous impact on the environment will feature heavily in a dynamic awareness campaign to tackle youth vaping on campuses following a partnership between Australian Catholic University and Quit Victoria.

A Collective Impact Vaping Prevention Program 2.0 grant from VicHealth means ACU will join universities, elite sporting bodies and Quit Victoria to deliver localised vaping and other nicotine-related prevention activities.

Underpinned by the successful VicHealth campaign, UNCLOUD, a youth-targeted initiative, students from ACU’s two Victorian campuses will co-design online materials to engage their peers and raise awareness of the realities of vaping.

“This will be so much more than health warnings,” said research team leader Dr Murooj Yousef from ACU’s Peter Faber Business School.

“ACU students will contribute to a variety of compelling, culturally sensitive materials that will resonate with young people and empower them to say no to vaping.”

Dr Yousef, Professor Joy Parkinson, Associate Professor Kate Letheren, Dr Alex Campbell and Dr Stefani Vasil will form the academic team behind the project.

ACU’s significant proportion of low socio-economic students, and with its Ballarat campus serving regional and rural Victoria, make it an ideal community to reach students from areas where youth may be at a heightened risk of nicotine addiction due to higher smoking and vaping rates, limited health education access, and fewer cessation support services (Scollo & Bayly, 2023). 

The many harmful health impacts of vaping will be a key message, but the social marketing strategies will also touch on the environmental damage caused by vapes and the tobacco industry’s tactics in marketing to these young consumer groups.

To deliver prevention solutions and achieve impactful change, the campaign will target students in novel ways.

Young people will be incentivised by a points system to visit an online platform co-designed by ACU students, researchers, gamification experts and web developers.

Videos and other digital assets will deliver messages around the impacts of vaping.

The planning and design stage will commence in 2026, with the campaign to roll out in 2027.

Media Contact: Damien Stannard, 0484 387349, damien.stannard@acu.edu.au