Three of RMIT's outstanding industry engagement collaborations received awards at the 2026 Engagement Australia Excellence Awards.
The University was a finalist in three categories and was named the winner in each, taking home the awards for Excellence in Industry Engagement (The RMIT & Aurecon Design Academy), Outstanding Engagement for Student Learning (Inside Out Prison Exchange & Prison-and Community Think Tanks) and Excellence in Student and/or Alumni Engagement (RMIT & ACMI Major University Partnership).
Community engagement is an essential part of a tertiary institution's purpose in society, allowing it the opportunity to fulfil its social responsibility and community impact in society.
The University's longstanding commitment to civic contribution and serving our communities is one of the key pillars that make up part of RMIT's Knowledge with Action strategy to 2031.
"It's wonderful that these outstanding projects have received deserved recognition for their role in helping create positive social impact within their communities," said Professor Naomi Stead, Associate Deputy Vice-Chancellor Engagement in the College of Design and Social Context at RMIT.
"RMIT is passionate about working in partnership with business, industry, the cultural sector, policymakers and communities, to create new knowledge and address societal and environmental challenges.
"I'm particularly delighted that the creativity and social engagement of RMIT partnerships features so strongly in our awarded projects.
"These are relationships which have lasted and deepened over time, meaning that RMIT and its partners are able to do things together which each of us could never achieve alone."
Creating rounded professionals and bigger careers
At the awards, some of RMIT's most impactful partnerships and initiatives were nominated across a diverse range of categories.
The RMIT & Aurecon Design Academy won in the Excellence in Industry Engagement award category.
The Aurecon Design Academy (the Academy) is a three-year accelerator and professional learning program run in partnership between RMIT's School of Property, Construction and Project Management and the global engineering, design, and advisory firm Aurecon.
Co-designed with Aurecon to provide a bespoke, tailored solution to the unique workforce development requirements of the organisation, the Academy aims to develop design leadership, judgment, confidence, and transdisciplinary problem-solving skills in experienced Aurecon practitioners.
This year, the program celebrated its 10th anniversary. Each intake, around 15 senior-level participants are selected to engage in a mix of virtual and intensive face-to-face workshops, including a four-day immersion at RMIT's Melbourne campus. Graduates of the Academy are recognised with a Graduate Certificate in Design Management awarded by RMIT University.
The program was recognised earlier this year, winning Best in Class for Design Strategy at the 2026 Australian Good Design Awards.
It also received a Silver Stevie Award at the International Business Awards for excellence in collaboration between academia and industry, and was named a finalist in the AUBEA 2026 Industry-Academic Collaboration Award, recognised as an Excellence Awardee in the Human Resources Director Australia Awards for Best Learning and Development Program.
Changing the trajectory of life on the inside
RMIT's exceptional record of community engagement and impact has also been recognised with the Inside Out Prison Exchange & Prison-and Community Think Tanks, winning in the Outstanding Engagement for Student Learning award category.
Led by Professor Marietta Martinovic from RMIT's School of Global, Urban and Social Studies (GUSS), the program is a unique prison-based education model which brings together incarcerated ('inside') students and RMIT ('outside') students, delivering meaningful social and educational impact.
The University partnered with Corrections Victoria to develop Inside Out, which has now run for over a decade.
Undergraduate and postgraduate students from the School of Global, Urban and Social Studies join incarcerated students in the prison setting, where they study Comparative Criminal Justice Systems together for a semester - two hours a week for 13 weeks.
After finishing the course, student alumni can join prison-based think tanks, which have contributed to over 150 policy consultations and produced more than 50 reports for Corrections Victoria.
It is the only program of its kind in Australia, promoting social change by breaking down barriers between the community and incarcerated people.
The program and think tanks received international recognition in the 2024 Asia Pacific Triple E Award for Impactful Collaboration of the Year for driving social change and building community through collaboration. In 2025, the programs were selected as a finalist in the Shaping Australia Awards in the Future Builder category.
Program participants at the 10th anniversary celebration. Dr Marietta Martinovic top centre. Credit: Natalie Edge Photography A pipeline of budding creatives
Completing the suite of RMIT awardees, RMIT & ACMI Major University Partnership won in the Excellence in Student and/or Alumni Engagement award category.
The partnership was renewed this year, marking the continuation of a 10-year collaboration that has become a cornerstone of Australia's screen-based creative industries.
As Australia's #1 ranked university for Art & Design (QS World University Rankings by Subject 2026), RMIT's partnership with Australia's national museum of screen culture creates rich and diverse opportunities for collaborative public programming, and student, academic and public engagement.
A key initiative of the partnership is the ACMI + RMIT Audience Lab, an industry pathway program that invites game developers, filmmakers, moving image artists and other emerging screen-based creators to showcase works-in-progress and receive real-time feedback from museum visitors.
The Lab has tested more than 180 projects since 2018 and supported RMIT Bachelor of Design (Games) alumni who have gone on to receive major industry recognition.
Engagement Australia is an alliance that supports and services its members and their various communities. Its membership includes Australian universities as well as private colleges, academic and professional Associate Members.
Its objective is to lead and facilitate the development of best practice university-community engagement in Australia, by creating inclusive forums for discussion and development of engagement, promoting practice, fostering awareness, building capacity and developing resources.
The awards recognise genuine collaboration underpinning the work, and the production of impactful results. Each of the eight categories are judged by a panel of expert industry judges.
