The Digital Champions are the youth ambassadors of the Childnet Digital Leaders Programme. Childnet work closely with them to ensure that the programme is youth-led, they have opportunities to represent the Digital Leader community in many ways, including at events and in consultations. You can find out more about the Digital Champions here.
In this blog we ask some of the Digital Champions about their experience in the role this year, including highlights and how they have found taking part in the group throughout the COVID-19 school closures. Thank you to Cosima, Jess and Aimee for their insightful and thoughtful responses, which you can read below.
What has been your highlight of your Digital Champion role this year?
Cosima: For me my biggest highlight was either presenting our charter at Westminster to the MPs or talking to Baroness Nicky Morgan at the BT centre event on Safer Internet Day!
It was such a unique experience that not many people my age would get to do!
At first talking to the MPs was a little daunting but as the day progressed I became a lot more fluent in what I was saying, I guess practice makes perfect! In addition, once Aimee went on to go and do her speech, and I had to do everything solo, I felt kind of proud of myself for being able to do that!
As it I was talking about something I was passionate about when it came to doing our stand at the event, I found it quite rewarding in a way to get the message across to so many different representatives of different companies. Oh and a bonus was that I was on the news hehe!
How have you found your Digital Champion role throughout the COVID-19 pandemic?
Jess: During the COVID-19 pandemic, our lives have had to adapt in many ways, including the way we work and communicate. Although we haven’t been able to meet up in person a huge amount this year, by communicating online, the Digital Champions team has been able to keep in touch and continue to make a change. Personally, I feel as though being able to communicate more online has brought me closer to the team and made me feel like I am making a bigger impact with what I do. With more people using the online world as a way to chat with friends and work from home, we have been working hard to support our peers and other young people who are spending more time online and make sure they are safe and well. I feel like my role during this time has made me a more well-rounded person, and has helped me develop my communication and teamwork skills, despite only communicating through a screen. The rest of the team have done an awesome job of keeping us all informed and updated throughout this time, and I have felt more confident in my role than ever before. Although this has been an uncertain time for us all, I have felt more connected with not only my friends, but the rest of the Digital Champions and Childnet team and through more online communication, I have felt a bigger part of the team and a more confident person.
What would you say to someone thinking about applying to be a Digital Champion next year?
Aimee: If I could say one thing to someone who is thinking of applying to be a digital champion, I would say don’t allow any feelings of doubt, worry or anything else put you off it because it has been my best experience! It feels like a close family and you get to take part in a range of new and enjoyable opportunities that teach you so many skills as well as putting you in really influential positions with the ability to help and teach many people from all over. I’ve loved it so much and I would recommend it to everyone so, to everyone reading this, definitely try it!! 🙂
Thank you to our Digital Champions for sharing their thoughts on how they have found their role over the year. If you are interested in becoming a Digital Champion next year, then keep your eyes peeled for the next round of applications due to open in September.
Welcome to the March post of our monthly achievements and updates blog. Here we congratulate schools who have completed their training over the past month and share good news stories from Digital Leader schools.
Well done to the Digital Leader teams from the following schools who have recently completed their online training!
Brentfield Primary School – 2nd cohort!
Downside School
Kensington Prep School – 2nd cohort!
Lady Eleanor Holles Junior School
Monkshouse Primary School – 3rd cohort!
Notre Dame Senior School – 2nd cohort!
Penwortham Primary School
Rosebank Primary School
TASIS The American School in England- Secondary
School visits
Last month Siobhán and Fabian visited Barnfield Primary School Digital Leaders to learn about what they have been doing to share their online safety knowledge and support their peers when on the internet. We were really impressed with the Digital Leaders’ plans for how they will impact their school community in the coming months. Take a look at the blog post about our visit to Barnfield Primary School including some top tips for online safety that their Digital Leaders shared with us!
Safer Internet Day 2020
Well done to all of the Digital Leaders who took part in Safer Internet Day across the country by running and being involved in activities in their schools. Take a look at our blog post about the Safer Internet Day London event and the important roles that Digital Leaders had at the event, from running activities for the guests from industry and policy, to being the youth host and key note speaker!
Digital Leaders were also involved in developing the Young People’s Charter for Safer Internet Day, which Aimee and Cosima, two of our Digital Champions, presented to government on the day. Read more about the Young People’s Charter here.
Many Digital Leader teams across the UK featured on their schools’ Twitter on Safer Internet Day. Well done to all Digital Leaders involved in celebrating the day, we are so impressed with the breadth of activities that Digital Leaders were involved in at their schools. Safer Internet Day celebrations ranged from assemblies, to videos and lessons around the theme of #freetobe: exploring identity online.
Take a look at some examples of tweets featuring Digital Leaders celebrating Safer Internet Day below.
Make sure to let us know what your Digital Leader team did to celebrate Safer Internet Day to be featured in a blog post round up! Contact us at [email protected]
Siobhán and Fabian from the Childnet Digital Leaders team recently visited the Barnfield Primary Digital Leaders. They were very impressed with what the team have already achieved in school as well as their plans for the next few months!
The team have completed the core training modules and have also run assemblies in school for Anti-Bullying Week and Safer Internet Day. The assemblies were such a success that after watching them other pupils wanted to become Digital Leaders too! We want to say well done to the Barnfield Digital Leaders for making such a big impact in their school already. No doubt that the team will make an even bigger impact in the next few months as they have impressive plans to share their online safety knowledge and support pupils in their school to keep safe online.
The team’s plans include writing for the school newsletter and running a school poster-making competition. We think these are fantastic ways to get their online safety messages out to the whole school and to encourage pupils to think creatively!
Whilst visiting them the Barnfield Primary Digital Leaders also shared their top online safety tips with us. These included:
Don’t share your personal information
If you receive nasty messages, you don’t need to reply
Always tell an adult when in doubt
Be careful who you talk to online
Be kind online
We had a great time visiting the Barnfield Primary Digital Leaders and talking to them about their role as Digital Leaders in school. Thank you to Ms Vessey and the fantastic Digital Leaders for welcoming us to your school. Good luck and keep us updated with what you achieve!
If your Digital Leaders would like a school visit from the Childnet Digital Leaders team, then please get in touch at [email protected].
Make sure to keep us up to date with what your Digital Leaders achieve in school by emailing [email protected] and tweeting @ChildnetDL.
Welcome to the February post of our monthly achievements and updates blog. Here we congratulate schools who have completed their training over the past month and share good news stories from Digital Leader schools.
Well done to the Digital Leader teams from the following schools who have recently completed their online training!
Anderton Park Primary
Caldershaw Primary School
Christ Church CE (VC) Primary – 2nd cohort!
Christ the King RC Primary School – 2nd cohort!
Foxhills Junior School
Frogmore Junior School – 3rd cohort!
Kinsley Primary School – 2nd cohort!
Our Lady and St Rose of Lima Primary School – 2nd cohort!
Rochester Independent College – 2nd cohort!
St. Louise’s Comprehensive College
St Olave’s Prep School
Safer Internet Day is in just a few days, on Tuesday 11th February. Make sure that your school has signed up as a supporter for the day. Download the education packs here if you need some last minute activity ideas for the day and make sure to use the social media guide to engage in the social media campaign on the day. We can’t wait to see what Digital Leaders across the country do for Safer Internet Day 2020. Make sure to tweet @ChildnetDL@UK_SIC so we can see what your team are doing on the day and retweet you!
Digital Leader School Visits
Over the past month the Childnet Digital Leaders team visited St. Martins School in Derby and Penwortham Primary School in London to talk to their Digital Leader teams and find out more about what they are doing in in their roles at school.
St. Martin’s School
We visited St Martin’s School along with Phoebe and Kate from the Childnet Education team and were very happy to be involved in the assembly where the team were announced to the whole school! Siobhán was able to present the school with two certificates in the assembly and they received their Digital Leaders badges also. Well done to the team for completing the training, we are impressed with what they have already accomplished such as making a game with internet safety messages as well as a leaflet for all parents/carers. Thank you to the Digital Leaders and their teacher, Sam, for welcoming us to their school. Take a look at our blog post to find out more about our visit and see the fantastic leaflet that the St. Martins’ Digital Leaders created.
Penwortham Primary School
We visited Penwortham Primary School Digital Leaders last month and really enjoyed hearing about their exciting plans for the future. They shared their ideas for the year with Charlotte, including their plan to have a ‘Digital Leaders Day,’ which would be a day to allow pupils to try out the role of being a Digital Leader before applying. What a brilliant idea! One of the Digital Leaders had also created a wonderful poster for Safer Internet Day which included a poem they had written:
‘Be safe,
Be yourself,
Be you,
Not someone else.’
Take a look at our blog post to read the fantastic article that the Penwortham Primary School Digital Leaders wrote for their school newsletter. Thank you to the Digital Leaders for sharing your thoughts and ideas with us and Ms Berner and Ms Shipsey for hosting us.
We love visiting Digital Leader teams in action, if your team would like a visit then please get in touch at [email protected].
We are looking forward to working with Digital Leader teams throughout 2020 and really excited to see what Digital Leaders achieve this year! Please share with us what your Digital Leaders team have been up to. Email [email protected] or tweet us @ChildnetDL#ChildnetDL to be included in the next update!
