To celebrate National Civic Health Month in August, you’re invited to join Wisconsin’s 2026 Civic Health Challenge, organized by the Civic Health of Wisconsin Initiative.

The Civic Health Challenge is designed to help us become active contributors to the civic health of our communities. 67% of past participants felt the Civic Health Challenge increased their awareness of their community and 75% reported an increased understanding of civic health. Click here to sign up now!

What is Civic Health? We define “civic health” as: individual and collective engagement for communities to define and address public problems, and work toward conditions in which all can truly thrive, and which promote democracy.

What is Civic Health Month? A time when over 400 organizations around the country join together to “celebrate, learn, and take action to improve the civic health of their communities.” We’ve taken inspiration from Vot-ER to launch our own Civic Health Month, focusing on our definition of civic health and the issues that matter most in Wisconsin.

What is the Wisconsin Civic Health Challenge? A month of virtual trainings and individual challenges, based in Wisconsin’s Civic Health Report, and connected directly to the issues we care about most in our communities. You’ll grow your civic health muscles and connect with others around the state who share your interest in community engagement, shared problem solving, and democracy. More information will be shared through social media and email in the coming weeks.

How to sign up: FREE to participate. Register online to receive challenges starting the first week of August.

Challenge Themes:

• Elections & public sector participation
• Volunteering, charitable giving, group participation, and social connectedness
• Information consumption, depolarization, and threats of political violence
• K12 civics education and youth engagement

Each week, experts will provide a 30-minute educational presentation, followed by 30 minutes of interaction, connecting the weekly theme to relevant issues in our state and communities. These workshops will cover topics like:

• How does local government work and how can we meaningfully participate? We’ll talk about the ways people in our state have already engaged local governments around Data Centers.
• As individuals, how can we find opportunities to give back through volunteering? As organizations, how can we better structure and promote opportunities? We’ll talk about the many ways that volunteers are critical to health and wellbeing in our state.
• How can we be responsible consumers of information in the rapidly changing media landscape? We’ll explore the very different ways that people are learning about affordability, cost of living, and the economy, based on their “media diet.”
• How can youth involvement in our organizations make our work better? How can we engage youth? We’ll learn how youth are already leaders in issues like mental health care and school referendum, and the creative ways they’re making a difference.

Source: https://commnsknowledge.wisc.edu