Highlights from our 1st National Digital Citizenship Summit
October 3, 2015
Presentations & Resources
Bring Digital Citizenship to Every Classroom, Kerry Gallagher, JD
Let’s Get Real: Preparing High School Students for College & Careers Through Digital Citizenship Education, Jennifer L. Scheffer & Timmy Sullivan
Presentation — Protect Yo’Self Fool (2015) & Periscope — Protect Yo’Self Fool, Sarah Thomas
Spotlight on Library Media, Jenny Lussier
Leveraging Social Media in Elementary Classrooms, Tracy Mercier
Archives
Digital Citizenship Summit, Judy Arzt
Digital Citizenship Summit Part I and Part II, Jenny Lussier
Reflections
5 Things to Know about The Digital Citizenship Summit–Our #DigCitSummit Roundup (GoEnnounce)
Presenting at the First National Digital Citizenship Summit (Timmy Sullivan)
The First Annual #Digcit Summit (Dan Whalen)
Cyberwise: Digital Citizenship Summit Recap via Dan Whalen
Students are the Solution at #DigcitSummit (Marialice B.F.X. Curran)
Let’s Get Real: Reflections on the First National Digital Citizenship Summit (Jenn Scheffer)
The Part of Technology Education That we ShouldTalk About First (Kerry Gallagher) via Connect Safety
2015 Speakers
Devorah Heitner, PhD (Chicago) is the founder and CEO of Raising Digital Natives based in Chicago, IL. She is an experienced keynote speaker, workshop leader, consultant and policy adviser to public and independent schools across the country. Devorah recently gave a popular TEDx talk on the challenges of raising a digital native.
A former professor, Dr. Heitner has a Ph.D. in Media/Technology and Society from Northwestern University and is the co-author of the Connecting Wisely Social/Emotional Digital Citizenship curriculum (Youthlight Press, 2015). Devorah works with administrators, faculty and students on communicating with empathy in the digital age. She leads parent engagement strategy for school districts, and specializes in helping bridge communication gaps between educators, parents and students.
Devorah has spoken at SXSWedu, the National Association of Independent Schools, Media in Transition at MIT, TEDx Naperville, and many other conferences and meetings across the country.
You can follow her on twitter @devorahheitner.
Janell Burley Hofmann (Massachusetts) is an author, speaker and consultant on topics like technology, media, health, relationships and personal growth. Janell is the author of the book,iRules: What Every Tech-Healthy Family Needs to Know About Selfies, Sexting, Gaming and Growing Up. She has also presented at TEDx San Diego with a talk titled “Parenting in the Screen Age.”
Janell has worked with schools, shelters, families, educators, children and teens while offering private parent coach, business and community consultations. Janell’s professional expertise and personal experience as a mother of five children builds strong connections with a wide and varied population. Janell engages readers, clients and audiences in relevant and meaningful conversations igniting personal empowerment, awareness and purpose in a partnership that will positively impact all.
Janell is an essayist and contributor to the Huffington Post, Maria Shriver, and other media outlets. Janell is a contributor to APR’s Marketplace Tech. Janell’s TEDx TALK: Parenting in the Screen Age and on Good Morning America.
Twitter: @JanellBH
Dr. Mike Ribble (Kansas): Known as the godfather of digital citizenship, Dr. Ribble is an international speaker, researcher and author of the books Digital Citizenship in Schools (soon to be in its 3rd edition) and Raising a Digital Child. He has worked within the education field his entire career. He has been a science educator and an assistant principal at the high school level.
Dr. Ribble has taught as an adjunct faculty member at the community college and the university level. Currently, he works as the director of technology for a school district in Kansas. Dr. Ribble has spoken on the topic of digital citizenship to parents, teachers and students in the United States and internationally and also co-moderates the Digital Citizenship Twitter chats. For more information on the nine elements of digital citizenship, please visit Dr. Ribble’s website.
Twitter: @digcitizen
Diana Graber is the co-founder ofCyberWise.org and the founder (and teacher) of Cyber Civics™, a middle school digital literacy program that kicks off with a full-year of digital citizenship lessons. CyberWise, which promises to leave “no grownup left behind,” serves as a valuable hub of learning materials for adults who want to help kids use technology wisely.
A regular contributor to The Huffington Post and many other publications, she is often tapped by the media to comment on how technology impacts human behavior. Her no-nonsense approach comes from being an educator, media producer, academic, and most of all, a mom.
As Adjunct Faculty of the Media Psychology M.A. program at the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology (MSPP), she also taught Digital Literacy and Citizenship to graduate students. Graber has a B.A. in Communications Studies from UCLA, and an M.A. in Media Psychology & Social Change from Fielding Graduate University/UCLA.
Twitter: @DianaGraber
Dr. Shelley Prevost (Tennessee) is co-founder and CEO at Torch whose mission it is to make the internet a wonderful place for kids to grow up. She is a partner at venture capital firm Lamp Post Groupand the JumpFund, an angel fund investing in female-led startups with high growth potential.
Shelley writes and speaks about her work on parenting, purpose, relationships, and leadership, most recently at TedxBarcelonaWomen with a talk entitled “Lead Like a Girl.” She has columns for Inc. and The Huffington Post and her work has also appeared in Time, Yahoo Business, Fast Company, LifeHacker, and Business Insider.
Find her on Twitter: @ShelleyPrevost
Reuben Loewy (New Jersey) is Founder and Director of Living Online Lab, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preparing students to be informed, critical and active participants in our digital society. The curriculum that Reuben has developed to teach about the Digital Revolution has been described as “the liberal arts of virtual living” in a feature article in The Atlantic (“Digital Natives, Yet Strangers to the Web”, April 2015).
Reuben’s work highlights a significant anomaly in our schools today; students are increasingly being given tablets and notebooks, but they are not being taught about the Digital Revolution, its affect upon us as individuals and how it is transforming our world. The Living Online curriculum that Reuben has developed covers topics such as Bytes and Bots: How the Internet Works, Cyberpsychology, The Economy of the Internet, Cyberethics, Cyberskeptiks vs. Digital Utopianism, and Digital Activism.
Reuben teaches Journalism and Media Studies at an independent school in Princeton. In his previous career as a foreign correspondent, Reuben reported from the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and the Balkans, for The Globe & Mail, The New Statesman, and other media. Born in London, Reuben is a graduate of the London School of Economics and Political Science (M.Phil., International Relations). He is trilingual and has lived and worked in England, Scandinavia, Africa, and the Middle East before settling in Princeton, New Jersey.
Twitter: @LivingOnlineLab
Denise Lisi DeRosa (DC) is the former Program Manager for the Family Online Safety Institute. She is dedicated to empowering families with the tools needed to embrace the current social and digital technologies in meaningful, creative and positive ways. Denise was responsible for developing and promoting FOSI’s Good Digital Parenting Initiative as a valuable resource for parents.
Prior to joining FOSI Denise worked as a Program Manager for AOL’s Kids Only Channel, devoted to providing a fun and safe place online for kids to enjoy. Denise has a Master’s of Arts Degree in Communication, Culture and Technology from Georgetown University. Her thesis, entitled “Creating Gateways for Girls in the New Technologies” focused on how developing video games for girls could help to interest them in computer sciences and careers in technology.
After graduating with a Bachelor’s in Marketing from Providence College, Denise worked for several years at MTV Networks in New York City, at both Comedy Central and VH1.
Denise is a married mother to three enthusiastic users of media and technology and understands first-hand the opportunities and challenges parents face in navigating the online world with their children. In her role at FOSI, she hopes to impart the importance of media literacy, cyber safety and cybercivility for kids, teens and parents.
Twitter: @DeniseLDeRosa
Janel Patterson (St. Louis) is the CEO and Co-Founder of social media platform Frienedy, along with running the Electronic Parenting blog. She has a monthly “E-parenting” column in Catholic Family magazine. Janel is passionate about promoting positive digital citizenship and empowering parents with tools to take ownership of introducing children to online interaction and social media.
The personal experience of Janel’s own daughter using social media caused her to leave the corporate world behind, after a 20-year career in sales in management, to set out and create a better social media platform. The mission was to create a safe, COPPA compliant, site that would give parents a way to introduce their children to social media on their terms, as well as a site that would help families, classrooms, sports teams, and groups of all types connect and collaborate privately in a single application. Three and a half years of development later, Janel and her team launched investor- backed Frienedy in April 2015.
Janel’s goal for Frienedy is to change the social media paradigm to promote selective sharing with private groups as a path to effect more positive digital reputations and reduce cyber bullying. Through Frienedy, as well as through the information she provides in her blog and magazine column, Janel offers online tools and expertise for parents to get back in the driver’s seat when it comes to their children learning how to engage and navigate a rogue and sometimes predatory online environment.
She is based in the St. Louis area.
Alan Katzman (Greater NYC): Founder of Social Assurity. Social Assurity is the leading youth social media advisory service in the country. They work with students and families on customized social media training to maximize the students’ opportunities and use of social media to their advantage.
He is an entrepreneur and former attorney with an expertise in law, technology and software, compliance, human resources and investigations. Katzman has lectured extensively on the topic of social media optimization for students and parents, has published numerous articles on the topic, and is considered by the media as a pioneer and an authority on social media for today’s youth and also co-moderates the Digital Citizenship Twitter chats.
Twitter: @socialassurity
Sarah Thomas (Virginia): Thomas is a Google Certified Innovator and founder of the EduMatch project, which promotes connection and collaboration among teachers around the world. She teaches technology at one of the county’s three magnet STEM high schools.
Sarah holds a Masters degree from Howard University in the field of Curriculum and Instruction. She is currently a doctoral candidate at George Mason University, with a major in Education. Her upcoming dissertation, Using Technology to Facilitate Language Acquisition of English Language Learners, is rooted heavily in student-created artifacts through the use of project-based learning.
Sarah is a winner of the 2014 Digital Innovation in Learning Award in the “Sharing is Caring” category, and was named by the National School Board Association as one of the “20 to Watch” in 2015. In addition, she received the honor of the Prince Georges County Public Schools Outstanding Educator Using Technology in 2015.
Twitter: @sarahdateechur
Timmy Sullivan (Massachusetts) lives the motto, “Every Day is a First Impression.” The Burlington High School junior has followed in the recent portion of his academic, professional, and personal career. Timmy is immensely passionate about education, and firmly believes quality education should be free to all students. He is constantly promoting effective use of technology to impact the online public education campaign, and to provide personalized learning for students worldwide.
Timmy stands to support and promote free scholastic resources as well as improve the quality of education in today’s academic system. He is eagerly pursuing studies in language and culture, marketing and communications, as well as technology integration. Committing himself immensely to both his community and his peers, Timmy holds leadership and mentor positions in the National Honor Society, Class Office, Spanish Club, Peer Tutoring Society, DECA Business Club, The Devils’ Playlist, TED Ed Club, Poetic Ramblings, Burlington High Theatre, Mentor Program, BHS LEADership Team, Rotary Interact, and the Multicultural Club. Of his many academic leadership positions, Timmy was awarded the title of Student Genius in Burlington’s Student Tech Team due to his outstanding contributions and leadership demonstration.
Timmy recently assumed the role of Student Director, managing his team through a variety of innovative and challenging technological responsibilities, such as integrating technology effectively into the curriculum, troubleshooting errors, presenting at nationally recognized technology conferences, consulting with professional app and web designers, and writing for and maintaining globally recognized blogs. Studying in a 1:1 iPad district has provided him with the opportunity to connect with professionals in various industries, leading him to his current positions as an Educational Videographer, Professional Educational-Technology Blogger, and App Consultant.
Twitter: @TimmyS54
Jennifer Scheffer (Massachusetts): Mobile Learning Coach and Instructional Technology Specialist at Burlington Public Schools. She is a dynamic and energetic teacher leader with over a decade of experience teaching project-based computer technology, marketing, and business management courses. Jenn leads the globally recognized student run Help Desk.
Jennifer is passionate about helping teachers reach today’s learners through integrating technology into their instruction to deliver a real-world, personalized and relevant education. Jennifer is also dedicated to sharing student voice and co-moderates the Digital Citizenship Twitter chats. She coaches students on how to leverage social media tools to showcase their talents, create a positive online presence, and build their professional network. For more information, please visit Jenn’s blog.
Twitter: @jlscheffer
A University of Saint Joseph graduate, Tracy Mercier (Connecticut) has led the way in digital citizenship in her elementary classroom. Currently a Grade 4 teacher at Manchester Public Schools, Tracy enthusiastically embracesa blended classroom where she helped her students transfer face-to-face ethical and compassionate communication skills to their ever changing and complex digital lives. This digital citizenship experienced is highlighted in Caltha Crowe’s book How to Bullyproof Your Classroom, Imagine Learning’s post 10 Reasons We Need Social Media in Classrooms, and Smilebox Featured Teacher. To view the students’ digital learning experiences visit Tracy’s website.
Currently, Tracy helps educators across the country create engaging classrooms as a Responsive Classroom Consultant. She develops online courses for Responsive Classroom teachers interested in strengthening their practice, and is a blogger and author for the Center for Responsive Schools.
The digital citizenship (#digcit) chat on Twitter began in September 2011 on USJ’s campus when Curran and Mercier co-founded the chat. The first #digcit chat originally started as an opportunity to connect teacher candidates with other educators passionate about digital citizenship. Since 2011, it has grown into an influential bi-weekly conversation that connects educators, administrators, organization and industry leaders, parents, and students from around the world. Both Curran and Mercier have been recognized as digital citizenship bloggers to follow by Common Sense Media. Tracy also curates the #digcit daily on Twitter.
Tracy has shared her passion for digital literacy and digital citizenship at numerous conferences, private consulting, and as an Adjunct Professor at the University of Saint Joseph. She has co-organized several events at USJ including the iCitizenship Town Hall Meeting (2012) and two unconferences for local educators, Dialogue 21 (2012 & 2013).
Twitter: @vr2ltch
Dr. David Greenfield (Connecticut) is the founder of The Center for Internet and Technology Addiction (virtual-addiction.com) and an Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. He is recognized as one of the world’s leading voices on Internet, computer, and digital media behavior, and a pioneer concerning compulsive and addictive use. He is the author of the Virtual Addiction, which rang an early warning bell with tech overuse when it came out in 1998.
Dr. Greenfield lectures to public and medical/psychiatric groups throughout the world, and has appeared numerous times on CNN, Good Morning America, The Today Show, CBS Early Show, Fox News, The O’Reilly Report, Anderson Cooper, and NBC News, and HBO. His work has also been featured in U.S. News and World Report, Business Week, Newsweek, People, Time, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, the Economist, and numerous other popular publications. He is widely credited with popularizing the dopamine/tech use connection, a topic he was discussing in the late 90s.
Dr. Greenfield’s recent research and clinical work is focused on why digital technologies are abused, how we can achieve balanced use of digital technology, the neurobiology of compulsive Internet use, and most recently on compulsive smartphone use. He is the author of numerous professional journal articles and book chapters on Internet, computer, and digital behavior. Dr. Greenfield recently released the education DVD: “Raising Generation D: A Guide for Parents Raising Children in the Digital Age.”
Dr. Greenfield is a fellow and past-president of the Connecticut Psychological Association and a member of American Society for Addiction Medicine, and The Sexual Medicine Society of North America.
Twitter: @CITACenter
Dr. Kortney Peagram (Chicago) is the President and Owner of Bulldog Solution, and a writer for Chicago Now (Bully Boot Camp). Using activities, group discussions, and team building concepts, Bulldog Solution provides student programs and professional development for teachers in the areas of digital citizenship, cyberbullying, and improved communication.
Dr. Peagram and her company provide schools and communities with the resources, curriculum, and result-oriented action plans to facilitate positive change. She also works with corporate organizations and camps to provide programs on conflict management, team building, and group management. Dr. Peagram has developed training programs on evidence-based research and behavioral models to increase the overall training effectiveness.
Dr. Peagram consults, writes, facilitates, and presents on topics that focus on the emotional and behavioral development. Her passion is to reduce bullying and violence in schools, with the goal to start making a difference by using her skills as a facilitator. She has been a featured expert on anti-bullying and program development on Fox 32 News Chicago.
Dr. Peagram is also an Adjunct Professor at The Chicago School of Professional Psychology, and resides in the Chicago area.
Twitter: @kpeagram
Matt Soeth (California) is the co-founder of the #icanhelp campaign and the iCanHelpLine.
Soeth has worked in Education for 15 years working as a coach, English teacher, CTE Video Production, and Student Leadership. Matt serves as the Technology Coordinator for the California Association of Directors of Activities (CADA) developing technology curriculum for activity directors in California and across the United States.
Two years ago, Matt co-founded #icanhelp, a nonprofit organization committed to leadership training, peer-mentoring, and professional development and digital media. In addition, Matt is helping to launch a funding campaign for the iCanHelpLine for Schools: part 411 and part 911, a helpline and online database for schools to use when they need help dealing with negative social media, cyberbullying, sexting and reputation issues that violate terms of service.
@matthewsoeth | #icanhelp | iCanHelpLine
Kerry Gallagher (Massachusetts) is the 2014 recipient of the Yale-Lynn Hall Teacher Action Research Prize for her submission “Mobile Devices and Student Innovators: BYOD and the Paperless Classroom Model.”
A frequent and sought-after speaker, Kerry has appeared at ISTE, MassCUE, Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence National Conferences, and symposiums hosted by Harvard Law School, Stanford University, and Yale School of Management. She was named in the Edtech and Elearning: Top 100 Influencers and Brands by Onalytica in August 2015, and recognized as a 2015 PBS LearningMedia Digital Innovator (view here video here).
Kerry is a regular contributor to outlets such as EdSurge, Smarter Schools Project, ConnectSafely, and Corwin-Connect. Connect with her now, and see her in person on Sat, October 3rd at the Digital Citizenship Summit!
Twitter: @KerryHawk02
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