From the 25th to the 26th of November the consortium gathered in person at the University of Girona for the first time since the kick off meeting in Oslo 2020. Since the fourth-wave of COVID-19 is with us across Europe, some of our consortium members joined us remotely via zoom. Oslo Met and the University of Girona worked together to ensure that there was effective hybrid participation, allowing the whole consortium to share insights and reflections without difficulties.
Representatives from each work packages presented the current state of their research, with many able at the stage to give us preliminary findings. This was helpful in starting to discuss the overall messaging coming from the project and kick start how we can transfer this into impact through future research, policy making, and practice. It also allowed the overlaps but also nuances between the work packages to become more apparent.
Maria Symeonaki from WP2 presented the new interactive map on ‘ICT usage amongst children and young people’ which will be communicated across our networks in January 2022. This will be a useful tool for researchers, students, educators, and policy makers alike. The consortium also further discussions on the production of a ‘toolkit’ for WP7. The process is well underway now to create a useful set of resources for children and young people to be able to navigate the risks and opportunities of the digital era.
Elizabeth Gosme from COFACE started the discussion on plans for the final conference in Brussels 2022. This will be an exciting chance for the consortium to share their findings and make impact at the European and national levels. There was also a strong push to integrate child participation into the conference, since this is their DigiGen.
Next stop is Leicester in March 2022.