Digital inclusion - why participation is important

Much of the debate around open education has focused on formal education, but education is not limited to formal approaches. For many youth organisations and charities, education is about helping young people build confidence and life-long skills. This participatory approach to education means the ‘digital-inclusion’ of adults is less about accessibility of educational content and more about participation in online practices and engaging with young people in the online world. 

This post is an edited version of my paper written to explore the principles of digital openness, how these could align to organisational approaches. The debates here form the backdrop to my project for H818, and outline my beliefs about inclusion in the open landscape. It asks why barriers exist and whether inclusion really matters in our context.

Cameron Gray 'The Journey Begins' http://parablevisions.com/?page_id=2338

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Defining education

The Scout Association defines education as ‘a life-long process which enables the continuous development of a person’s capacities both as an individual and as a member of society’ (World Scout Bureau, 1998, page 7). We are a non-formal educational movement where young people and adults work in partnership, learning by doing through a structured framework of activities and experiences. 

The pedagogical approach is comparable, in my opinion, to social constructivism, in which individuals learn through their interaction with others and the world around them (Palinscar, 1998, Vygotsky 1978).  It also reminds me of John Seely Brown’s notion of ‘social learning’ , as it suggests that we define ourselves by the societies we belong to (Brown and Adler, 2008). Learning is about participation (with others and the world) and therefore we ‘learn to be’ as well as learn about ‘things’. Consequently ‘how’ we learn is just as important as ‘what’ we learn as we are constructing our identity through our community interactions (Hager andHodkinson, 2009). This is important when considering the digital openness of non-formal education, as the barriers are not just ‘what’ can be accessed, but also ‘how’ to participate in the online world.

So ‘education’ from a Scouting perspective is essentially about personal development and ‘learning to be’, within a values-based community, supported by adults working alongside young people. Therefore it is not just about subject matter expertise or specific skills and knowledge, but about life-long personal skills, developing confidence and engaging with the world in a positive way. ‘Education’ is non-formal, and manifests as an approach to life realised through participation.

Digital openness and open education

Open education is loosely defined by the Open Education Working Group (2014) as ‘any practices and activities that have openness and education at their core’ (page 8). Veletsianos (2010) notes that educators can shape or be shaped by openness. But openness means different things to different people. Defining openness, within a digital context, is important if we are to be shaped by it. The Oxford English Dictionary (2004) defines ‘open’ as not being closed, or as accessible or available. Thus digital openness could means making things available using digital technologies. The debates around open education mainly focus on formal education, and they converge around discussions about availability and talk about open access, open content and open resources (McAndrew, 2010).

Our definition of education however, is grounded in participation, and Weller (2011) reminds us that openness is not just about what technology can do for us, but also about our practices as scholars or educators. Networked participation is one of the three formats of open practices described by Veletsianosand Kimmons (2012) who highlight the importance of having and maintaining a digital presence. Developments in ‘social’ technology, tools like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, have also created a new emphasis on participation (Jenkinset al, 2005). 

Accordingly, if the definition of education is ‘learning to be’ and personal development happens through participation, then open education is surely about finding the opportunities to do this within the online world. 

So digital openness in this context, refers to exploring and being open to new, participative experiences in the online world. As a result, open education is not just about making educational content freely available to all (although there is plenty of educational content available to adults and young people) but about digital participation. At a very basic level this means that adults supporting young people in Scouting should be participating and interacting with young people online.

Barriers to online participation and digital inclusion

The UK Government defines digital inclusion as ‘having the right access, skills, motivation and trust to confidently go online’ (Cabinet Office, 2014). Discussions about the barriers to inclusion can fall neatly into the three categories of availability, accessibility and acceptability (Lane, 2009). 

Availability looks at the physical access to the online world, and considers economics (whether people can afford technology) and connectivity (the infrastructure, like broadband, that allows people to access the internet). Accessibility concentrates on usability barriers, that is the skills and the ease by which people can use the internet. Debates about digital literacy dominate this area, as well as discussion about accessibility of content or software for those who have disabilities or alternative needs. 

A lack of digital skills and the means to access the online world are not necessarily the only, or the biggest barrier that people face. The third category of digital inclusion barriers come under ‘acceptability’ and this relates to social empowerment, or having the motivation and confidence to go online. The Cabinet Office’s (2014) research found that 62% of people said that the most important reason for not being online was that they were ‘not interested’. Their lack of interest may be the result of many different factors. Some people see the online world as irrelevant for them, and thus it needs to be made relevant if they are to be motivated to participate. Others are dissuaded from participation because of their fears of the online world. This could be a fear of crime, attack, or a fear of venturing into the unknown and exposing themselves or their identities. Participation means vulnerability, and individuals need to be given the confidence to overcome this. 

Digital exclusion may arise through a combination of factors and each digitally excluded person will have their own reasons and set of circumstances (Lane, 2009). Digital inclusion is about overcoming all of these challenges (access, skills, motivation, and trust) and not just one. But does digital inclusion matter for adults in The Scout Association?

Does inclusion matter?

The simple answer is yes. If education is a life-long process of development as an individual and as a part of society then adults as well as young people should be participating and interacting online. However there are challenges to overcome in assisting online participation. 

Adults and young people within the organisation can help to remove the skills barrier, sharing and developing the digital literacies others need for online participation, just as they would when developing skills like hillwalking or archery. The purpose and method of Scouting are about engaging with the world in a positive way. The online world is a part of the world and therefore it has to be relevant for adults to participate within it. If adults are to be role-models and support young people where they are, then the values of Scouting should override any motivational barriers to digital inclusion, although adults in Scouting may need to be reminded of this. 

The largest barrier to overcome is trust. This will need both education and a focus on values. There are practical ways of overcoming security and privacy fears, but adults also need to address concerns about identity and openness. This must include practical ways of talking about how values should guide online identity and activities. It also includes understanding that openness is not an ‘all or nothing’ approach and so that volunteers can explore the online world with confidence and develop their own openness. It is also about helping adults to take the skills they already have, for example: identifying and mitigating risk, planning tasks and activities and developing codes of behaviour; and apply them in the online context.

Open practices, or digital openness, is really about seeking out new experiences and participating in new ways through the online world. Just as in the 'offline' world, there can be tensions between the principals and the practicalities (Lane, 2009) which we need to help adults explore and manage. 

Adults in Scouting do amazing things with young people every day, and whether they are climbing a mountain or using social media they should use the values and methods of scouting to understand that the online world is just another ‘undiscovered’ world of opportunity. Thus they can be part of the ‘open landscape’, exhibiting their values, being appropriate role-models and effective 'digital' citizens working in partnership with young people.

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Brown, J.S. & Adler, R.P. (2008). Minds on fire: Open education, the long tail, and Learning 2.0. EDUCAUSE Review, 43(1), pp.16-32
Cabinet Office (2014) Government Digital Inclusion Strategy, 13 April 2014
Hager, P. and Hodkinson, P. (2009) ‘Moving beyond the metaphor of transfer of learning’, British Educational Research Journal, 35 (4), pp.619–38
Jenkins, H., et al. (2005) Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century, MacArthur Foundation.
Lane, Andy (2009). The impact of openness on bridging educational digital divides. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 10(5), pp. 1–12.
McAndrew, Patrick (2010). Defining openness: updating the concept of “open” for a connected world. Journal of Interactive Media in Education, 2010(10), pp.1–13.
Oxford English Dictionary (2004) ‘Open’, Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press
Palincsar, A.S. (1998). Social constructivist perspectives on teaching and learning. Annual Review of Psychology, 49, pp.345–375.
Veletsianos, G. (2010). A definition of emerging technologies for education. In G. Veletsianos (Ed.),Emerging technologies in distance education (pp. 3-22). Edmonton, AB: Athabasca University Press.
Veletsianos, G. and Kimmons, R. (2012) Assumptions and challenges of open scholarship. The International Review Of Research In Open And Distance Learning, 13 (4) pp.166–189  
Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in Society. London: Harvard University Press.
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World Scout Bureau (1998) Scouting: An Educational System. World Scout Bureau. Switzerland.