About

Digital Disruption is a specialist education project that develops and distributes the tools and training to improve young people’s critical digital judgement skills. Digital judgement combines ‘traditional’ critical thinking skills, such as source verification, with ‘new’ knowledge about how the digital world works, such as understanding search engines and YouTube.

We also equip educators with the skills and resources they need, yet often lack, to effectively teach digital judgement in the classroom.

Our Mission:

To realise the Internet’s potential to benefit individuals and society – as something that informs, empowers, liberates and enlightens.

The Problem:

As the digital world continues to grow and to play an increasingly central role in how we all learn and form opinions about the world and each other, it is now more important than ever before to be able to tell good information from the bad, truth from lies, and to ably navigate the grey area of opinion in the middle.

This skill – digital judgement – is especially important for young people. They both trust and use the Internet more than any other generation, but are not always savvy, critical consumers of online content. This is no surprise. The older generations, often knowing even less about the Internet, are not in a position to provide the leadership and teaching young people need. Formal education also struggles to fill this void, as teachers lack the training and materials to do so.

Our Solution:

We create and supply the tools and training that young people need to be savvier, more discerning Internet users. We do this through real engagement and co-creation with young people. Tailored workshop programmes allow young people to discover themselves the techniques and scams that are used to manipulate them online. Through this, Digital Disruption arms young people with the skills they need to engage with the Internet on their own terms. This website is being developed as a one-stop-hub for teaching these critical digital judgement skills across the curriculum.

Meet the team

	Rebecca Ford | Project Director @RebeccaPFord
	Rebecca worked in anthropological research and development communications before moving to Bold Creative, where she secured and developed some of their most successful projects. As Director of Digital Disruption, Rebecca is committed to creating digital tools, campaigns and training programmes to improve education in the UK.

	Luke Newbold | Creative Producer @lukenewbold
	Trained in Drama, Applied Theatre & Education and skilled in delivering technical innovation projects, in his role as Digital Lead at Bold Creative Luke recently produced the UCL children’s hospital website and numerous interactive picture-book apps.

	Martin Orton | Strategic Advisor @marty_orton
	A passionate champion of the benefits of design-led innovation for social change, Martin is Managing Director of Bold Creative and has over 10 years experience generating and delivering digital education projects.

	Jamie Bartlett | Associate @JamieJBartlett
	Senior researcher at Demos and author of ‘Truth, Lies and the Internet: A report into young people’s digital fluency’, Jamie is currently working on a number of projects relating to critical thinking skills on the Internet, conspiracy theories, and the role of faith in Britain today.

	Carl Miller | Associate @carljackmiller
	Researcher at Kings College London and co-author of ‘Truth, Lies and the Internet: A Report into young people’s digital fluency’, Carl is currently involved in projects using ‘social media science’ to crowd-source solutions in a number of areas, from political polling to public policymaking.

	Laura Bailey | Associate @laurabailey
	A journalist by training, Laura is a freelance PR and media communications specialist. She is providing public relations and media communications support for Digital Disruption.