On 27–28 May 2025, Strasbourg hosted the first Digital Citizenship Education Forum, a gathering that brought together over 200 people from more than 30 countries. The event was organised by the Council of Europe as part of the European Year of Digital Citizenship Education, and it provided a timely space for experts and stakeholder to exchange views and reflect together.

In a truly democratic fashion, policy-makers, professional educators, researchers, members of the civil society, and representatives from the private sector joined this inaugural forum, titled Let’s Act Now. The purpose of the event was straightforward: to consider how digital citizenship education might be better integrated across Europe’s diverse educational landscapes—and to do so in a way that is both principled and practical.

Grounding the Conversation in Practice

Parents International director Eszter Salamon moderated discussions on inclusive participation, and our team member Aristidis Protopsaltis delivered a intervention presenting recent findings from the DRONE project. His remarks focused on the essential role families play in digital learning environments, and how research can usefully inform policy without prescribing overly rigid models.

Throughout the Forum, many participants returned to a shared concern: how to ensure that digital citizenship education does not remain an abstract aspiration, but becomes a lived part of education—whether formal or informal, in schools, homes, or communities.

Key Themes: Inclusion, Trust, and Responsibility

The programme was structured around a series of Forum Talks and plenary discussions. While the sessions covered a wide range of topics, certain threads emerged consistently:

• The links between education and democracy, particularly in light of disinformation and declining civic trust;
• The responsibilities of private tech companies—not only in terms of safety, but also in contributing positively to educational frameworks;
• The question of equity in access and opportunity, and how digital citizenship education can be made genuinely inclusive;
• And the importance of critical thinking and respectful dialogue in digital spaces.

The tone was, for the most part, constructive rather than alarmist. Participants acknowledged the challenges without exaggeration, and the conversations were marked by a willingness to listen and to share.

The European Year of Digital Citizenship Education

This forum was part of a broader effort under the European Year of Digital Citizenship Education 2025, which was formally launched by the Council of Europe in January. The year’s objective is to raise awareness of digital citizenship as a public and educational concern, and to embed it more firmly into national and local strategies.

A number of events and initiatives are planned across the year, including a final gathering in Ljubljana in November 2025, which will focus on translating ideas into long-term commitments. In between, partners across Europe are working to document good practices, pilot new approaches, and build stronger networks across sectors.

One of the strengths of the Year so far has been its relatively open-ended approach: the Council has provided a framework and a sense of direction, while allowing for considerable flexibility in how countries and organisations interpret and apply it.

IPA’s Contribution: Families at the Centre

For us, the Strasbourg Forum was an opportunity to affirm a longstanding belief: that families are not peripheral to education—they are central to it. This is particularly true in the digital sphere, where formal and informal learning environments frequently intersect.

By bringing research from the DRONE project into the discussion, we highlighted the importance of grounding innovation in real-world practice. Families often serve as the first, and sometimes the only, line of support when it comes to online safety, critical media literacy, or children’s rights in the digital world,

A Modest but Meaningful Start

There is a tendency, at international forums, to overstate impact or to make bold declarations. The Strasbourg Forum largely resisted that. What emerged instead was a sense of steady progress: a recognition that while the challenges are significant, so too is the collective will to address them.

Digital citizenship education will not be transformed overnight, nor should it be. However, events like this suggest that, when space is created for serious conversation and collaborative thinking, progress becomes not only possible but probable.

Looking Ahead

The real test of the European Year of Digital Citizenship Education will be what remains after it ends. If the conversations held in Strasbourg are anything to go by, there is good reason to hope that the work started here will continue with greater coordination, stronger partnerships, and a shared commitment to equipping citizens of all ages for digital life.

There is much still to do, but also, clearly, much to build on.

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Teacher Training in Kazakhstan: Public–Private Partnership for Education Development

The European Research Network About Parents in Education (ERNAPE) is a long-standing academic and practitioner platform focused on promoting high-quality research and dialogue around parental engagement in education. It brings together scholars, researchers, and professionals to share evidence, develop practice, and support inclusive policies. The 2025 conference in Verona centred on strengthening family-school-community partnerships for more equitable education systems.

At ERNAPE 2025 in Verona, Parents International director Eszter Salamon and project manager Luca Laszlo presented a set of interlinked research projects and practitioner insights. Together, they offered a timely reflection on the evolving relationship between families and schools—one that is, in many parts of the world, under increasing strain.

Drawing from recent international studies and European initiatives, our sessions focused on the underlying reasons for this tension, the growing disconnection between key stakeholders, and practical steps towards more equitable and effective collaboration.

ERNAPE Conferences are always a great opportunity to meet colleagues—including old friends—doing research on topics similar to ours, and this was no exception. We were glad to hear some presentations that reinforced our research-based messages. ERNAPE 2025 in Verona was also an opportunity to finally meet Karen L. Mapp in person, whose Dual Capacity-Building Framework has been part of our training for years.

Parents Are Reassessing the Role of Formal Education

One of the more concerning trends emerging from our work is the growing number of families opting out of formal education—not due to lack of access, but as a deliberate choice.

In a collaborative research project with the Brookings Institution, we engaged with families, teachers, school leaders and students across 16 countries, with fieldwork focused in Hungary, the Netherlands, and Kazakhstan. We sought to understand the level of satisfaction with current education systems, as well as the underlying beliefs driving engagement—or disengagement.

A consistent finding across contexts was that different stakeholder groups hold markedly different assumptions about the priorities of others. Teachers frequently believe that parents are primarily concerned with academic outcomes and future employability. In contrast, parents often place greater emphasis on their children’s emotional wellbeing, safety and sense of belonging. Students, for their part, frequently feel that their perspectives are overlooked altogether.

When these assumptions go unexamined, miscommunication becomes normalised. In some cases, this contributes to an erosion of trust between families and institutions.

ERNAPE 2025: Gaps Between Purpose and Experience

This divergence in expectations contributes to what might be described as a purpose-satisfaction gap. That is, even where schools are aligned with formal academic goals, they may fail to provide the broader support and relationships that families view as essential to a good education.

At the conference, we challenged the assumption—often taken for granted—that academic performance is the sole reason why families send their children to school. It may well be a starting point, but for many parents it is not sufficient. When schools are perceived as lacking in empathy, inclusion, or cultural relevance, families may feel disempowered or disengaged.

This is particularly evident in the experiences of migrant families, who often face structural barriers to engagement.

Parental Engagement Remains a Blind Spot in Teacher Training

Our Parents Engage project examined the extent to which teacher education prepares professionals to work in partnership with parents—especially those from minority or migrant backgrounds. The findings were instructive. In many cases, parental engagement remains an optional or marginal topic in teacher training programmes. Even where it is included, approaches tend to focus on technical communication rather than deeper relationship-building.

Many teachers, often from majority backgrounds, report discomfort or lack of preparation when engaging with families who do not share their cultural norms or languages. This lack of training and support risks reinforcing exclusion rather than overcoming it.

Through the Parents Engage project, we identified a range of promising practices, particularly from schools that work in collaboration with civil society organisations. These approaches typically involve flexible, community-based methods and a commitment to open, two-way dialogue.

Digital Literacy and the Challenge of AI

Technology is increasingly shaping how children learn, yet schools are struggling to keep pace. At ERNAPE, we presented the findings of the DRONE project, which explored digital literacy in the context of artificial intelligence (AI). The research, conducted in Germany and the Netherlands, focused on the experiences and perceptions of students, parents and teachers.

We found that:

• Students are regular users of AI tools such as ChatGPT, and generally confident in their ability to navigate digital spaces.
• Parents are aware of the risks and opportunities and would welcome clearer guidance and support from schools.
• Teachers often report limited confidence and uneven attitudes towards the integration of AI into their practice.

In particular, teachers’ limited engagement with current developments in AI raises concerns about their ability to support students in developing critical thinking and responsible use. Meanwhile, many parents feel they have been left to manage digital literacy with little institutional backing.

These findings suggest an urgent need for targeted training for professional educators, not only in the use of specific technologies, but also in the ethical, pedagogical, and relational dimensions of digital education.

Adult Behaviour and Its Impact on Peer Bullying

In a related session, we shared the outcomes of a scoping review led by Luca Janka László, who examined the relationship between adult behaviours and peer bullying as part of her Doctoral research within MSCA Participate. Drawing on 88 international studies, the review identified a clear connection between children who experience or witness aggression from adults—particularly within the family or school—and those who go on to engage in bullying behaviour themselves.

While the role of parents has been relatively well documented in this regard, research into the impact of teacher behaviour remains limited. Nonetheless, examples from several countries (e.g. Norway) suggest that teacher bullying—though underreported—does occur, and warrants serious attention in safeguarding and school climate initiatives.

This work underscores the importance of viewing adult conduct as part of the broader ecology of student wellbeing. Children are highly attuned to adult models of interaction; violence and disrespect at the top often trickle down.

ERNAPE Aftermath: Towards Meaningful Partnership

The overarching message from our contributions at ERNAPE 2025 was that schools cannot address today’s challenges alone. A meaningful transformation of education systems depends on forging genuine partnerships between families, professional educators, and policymakers.

Such partnerships require:

• Clear and reciprocal communication
• Recognition of parents’ knowledge and perspectives
• Practical training for professional educators on family engagement
• Inclusion of digital literacy within a whole-community framework
• Policy reforms that make room for co-creation and trust-building

In our view, these are not optional enhancements, but essential steps towards a more just, inclusive, and responsive education system.

TOWARDS ERNAPE 2027

This ERNAPE 2025 conference in Verona was a welcome opportunity to reaffirm our commitment to supporting and empowering parents, children, and professional educators across Europe and beyond. We look forward to continuing these important conversations at the next ERNAPE conference, to be held in Iceland.

If you are interested in collaborating with us on any of these topics, or would like to know more, please contact us via parentsinternational.org or explore our resources at library.parenthelp.eu.

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June 11-13. The World Anti-Bullying Forum was held in Stavanger, Norway, organised by Participate member, Prof. Hildegunn Faldrem and her team from The Norwegian Centre for Learning Environment. In the opening, the life and work of Prof. Peter Smith were honoured, many participants remembering him as a key figure of bullying research.

Throughout the three days of the conference, the Profs and doctoral candidates of the project made significant contributions to this prestigious event.

On the first day, Prof. Christina Salmivalli from the University of Turku served as the discussant of the symposium on “Predictors and Outcomes of Defending, Being Defended, and Friendships: A Focus on Victimisation,” where a paper, “Defending Behaviour and Victimisation: Between- and Within-Person Associations,” which she co-authored, was also presented.

In the afternoon, doctoral candidates Giorgia Scuderi (Aarhus University), Isabel Machado da Silva (Dublin City University), Kainaat Maqbool (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) held their workshop “Using Art to Engage Youth in (Cyber)Bullying Research: An Interactive, Creative Methodology Workshop” where the participants first heard about using different forms of art as qualitative research methods, then discussed other examples, the benefits and the challenges of using such methods.

On the second day, Prof. Dagmar Strohmeier from the University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria held her keynote speech on Teacher Bullying. Highlighting this under-researched and uncomfortable topic, she encouraged the participants to have the courage to explore it further and allow discussions to start. 

Following this powerful keynote, chaired by Prof. Serap Keles from the University of Stavanger, Participate doctoral candidates held a symposium titled Systematic approaches to understanding cyberbullying from different angles: contexts, consequences, and moderators. The presentation: Exploring Children’s Rights in the Digital Age with the Context of Parental Mediation Styles: A Scoping Review
(Meghmala Mukherjee, Dublin City University), Cyberbullying related to ethnicity or Indigeneity among children and adolescents: a systematic scoping review Luisa Morello , Norwegian Centre for Learning Environment and Behavioural Research in Education), The connection between children becoming peer bullying perpetrators and experiencing or witnessing violence/bullying by adults: a scoping review (Luca Laszlo, Parents International), Meta-regression analysis to investigate atypical moderators: The role of school and family factors in moderating cyberbullying victimisation outcomes (Ebru Ozbek, (Norwegian Centre for Learning Environment and Behavioural Research in Education) were followed by questions.

On the last day, chaired by Prof. Audrey Bryan from Dublin City University, six doctoral candidates presented their work at the symposium titled “The Complex Contextualisation of (Cyber)bullying: Insights from Different Theoretical and Methodological Approaches.” The presentations Within-country inconsistencies of (cyber)bullying prevalence in cross-national datasets: What role do different bullying definitions play? (Shan Hu, University of Stavanger), Interconnected Spaces: How Socio-Economic Contexts Shape Young People’s Understanding of (Cyber)Bullying Across Physical and Digital Worlds (Isabel Machado Da Silva, Dublin City University),  Parents’ Childhood Bullying Experience and the Advice They Give Their Children (Anastasiia Petrova, University of Turku), Parents´ situated experiences with gendered discourses in relation to their children’s involvement in online bullying (Deniz Celikoglu, Dublin City University and  Giorgia Scuderi, Aarhus University), Black Culture and Afrophobia: (De)Construction of Bullying in Communities of Practice
(Kainaat Maqbool, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) were followed by questions.

The conference brought together many researchers, professionals, and policymakers, all committed to understanding why, how, and when bullying happens, how it affects its participants and the community, and how we can prevent it, stop it, or deal with the damage it has done. The enthusiasm of the participants, the fresh ideas and the new research results will inspire many of us to continue our work with even more effort to achieve long-lasting change and contribute to a happier world with less bullying and more resilience, both for our children and for ourselves.

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Digital Citizenship Education: A Bold Step Toward a Smarter Future

I recently watched the Netflix series Adolescence. I did so primarily for professional reasons, as the themes it explores are closely aligned with those I deal with daily in my work.

I must admit that I struggled to get through the series. I took extensive notes, trying to maintain a reasonably objective perspective, but I fear I didn’t quite succeed.

Having also grown spiritually within the Indian tradition, I know that after the Brahmacharya , the student’s ashram, comes Grihastha, the householder’s ashram — the stage I find myself in today. I am a husband and a father. Both roles have marked definitive turning points in my life. I have never regretted building a family with my wife, and I have never wished not to be a father.

Adolescence is essentially about children, parents, and teachers. I still haven’t decided whether the plot was intentionally written to be openly misandrist or whether, as I suspect is more likely, it was developed to show British society what it has allowed itself to become.

The casting, for example, is no accident. Every substantial character—every character who is significantly positive or in a clear position of power — is Black. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the choice per se, but since casting is a deliberate process, it’s important to underscore that this is a conscious decision either by the producers or the creators of the series. The reasons for that choice are never fully understood.

The series opens with an apparently casual conversation between a chief inspector and his teenage son. It’s staged to highlight the healthy relationship between the two. The chief inspector is relatively young but already holds a position of power. He is of African descent, strong, confident. Moments later, the scene shifts to a tactical squad from Scotland Yard storming the home of a lower-middle-class family. The door is smashed in with a battering ram, officers sweep the rooms with small-calibre weapons drawn, and in the end, they arrest the suspect: a thirteen-year-old boy named Jamie. He is handcuffed, separated from his family, and taken into custody.

The dialogue between the adults and the teenager is crafted to show how everything happening is completely beyond the boy’s comprehension. He is repeatedly asked if he understands the consequences of what’s going on. He’s subjected to a series of standard-procedure questions, including, “Have you ever tried to kill yourself?” All of this takes place without a parent present. I already had chills.

By the end of the episode, it becomes clear that Jamie is responsible for a violent crime. During the interrogation, irrefutable evidence is presented, but only after the arresting officers make several attempts to manipulate Jamie — who is assisted by is clueless father and a court-appointed lawyer — into confessing or at least slipping up.

The second episode opens at Jamie’s school. All the white characters at the school are portrayed negatively. Two of Jamie’s friends discuss their families’ reactions to the crime he’s accused of.  While the Black character says “My dad went ballistic”, implying that the event did carry meaning for his family, the White scoffs “My parents couldn’t have cared less”. All the White teachers are shown as unable to manage their classrooms, lacking charisma, seemingly resigned to the inevitable. A Black female student assaults Ryan, one of Jamie’s friends, and the only comment from onlookers is “Ryan got beat up by a girl.”

The chief inspector and his partner are shown interviewing classmates and friends of the victim. What strikes me, both as a parent and as a teacher, is the way in which the interviews are conducted: the conversations happen without parental supervision, the students are never given an option to contact their parents. There is a member of the school staff present, but it is clearly depicted as someone the students are not familiar with and do not trust.

The episode’s most crucial moment—or at least the one presumably intended as such by the writers — is a conversation between the Chief inspector and his son, who also attends Jamie’s school. Without mincing words, the son says, “Since you’re going around in circles, let me explain what’s going on.” He then proceeds to list a few, relatively harmless clichés about the “manosphere,” the “80/20 rule,” and the meaning of emojis used in teenage messaging.

The point of all this is to suggest that Jamie, like many others, was manipulated by influencers who promote a brand of masculinity rooted in domination and violence. The problem is, there’s no further investigation by law enforcement, no in-depth analysis, no fact-checking. The investigators simply accept the explanation about the “manosphere” as fact—and, presumably, the viewers are expected to do the same.

In the end, Jamie’s White friend runs away from school. The Black inspector chases him down, corners him, and coerces a confession using both psychological and physical aggression — at which point Jamie’s fate is sealed. It emerges that Jamie had been the constant victim of cyberbullying by the very girl he eventually killed, instead of committing suicide as it often happens in similar situations, but no one seems to care.

The third episode contains scenes I found outright obscene. Jamie is in custody and takes part in a series of sessions with a female psychologist assigned to assess him and write a report for the judge. The psychologist’s behaviour is shamelessly predatory: she repeatedly plays with Jamie’s mental stability, successfully provoking aggressive reactions from him in which he expresses what is portrayed as a radically misogynistic attitude.

The psychologist bombards him with questions like, “How does it feel to be a man?” and “What do you think is the normal amount of sexual activity someone your age should have—with a boy or a girl?”. I kept thinking to myself: Jamie is thirteen years old, how is he supposed to know what being a man feels like in the first place?

It’s clear from the interaction that the sessions with the psychologist are valuable to Jamie because they offer a break from a daily routine that he finds suffocating and frightening. The psychologist encourages this dependency until she gets what she wants — then suddenly transforms into a complete stranger, severing the emotional bond.

The final episode depicts Jamie’s family experiencing the social stigma that derives from his trial. In one scene, his father is approached by a store clerk—skinny, unmuscular, bespectacled, and White — the polar opposite of the powerful, imposing chief inspector. The clerk whispers that he should turn to the “strength of the internet”, as this is clearly a case constructed for ideological purposes. When the father eventually breaks under pressure, he vandalizes his own van rather than lashing out at others.

I’ve read numerous commentaries — unfailingly from a very specific ideological and political perspective — that praise Adolescence as an invitation for men and boys to show “vulnerability” and reject violence. If that’s the case, it’s unclear why the chief inspector uses violence and aggression to extract the confession that condemns Jamie, why the Black female student assaults one of Jamie’s friends without apparent consequence, and so on.

To me, Adolescence is a harrowing depiction of the authorities’ — including schools’ — powerlessness to prevent incidents like these. There is mounting evidence in the EU that its attempt to redress “gender inequality” have led to the implementation of policies that have in fact penalized males for years. The rise of phenomena like the so-called “manosphere” cannot simply be dismissed as remnants of a “patriarchal culture”. In a truly healthy and egalitarian society, such movements would have no traction — because they’d have no reason to exist.

In Adolescence, parents are portrayed as equally incapable of understanding the world their children inhabit, the mechanisms that govern their interactions, and the means through which those interactions occur. There is an important debate underway about whether children should be given smartphones and internet access. For my part, I have no qualms about stating that a smartphone makes sense when it’s needed, not when it’s merely desired, but that’s not the real point. The fundamental issue is whether parents have created and maintained the conditions to ensure that dialogue with their children never breaks down.

Emanuele Bertolani

Parents International

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