Coach Susanna Bulgheroni on Project “Fully Enjoy the Internet.”
Susanna Bulgheroni is a long-time coach at the Fondazione Mondo Digitale and an early adopter of social media. “After graduating in Communications, I understood that advertising communications and marketing were the two sectors in which I felt most at ease. The Facebook era began, and I immediately perceived it as the channel of the future, not just to stay in touch with friends, but also for entrepreneurial activities and marketing. I experimented with it successfully over a period in which, in Italy, we weren't even talking about social media marketing, and it was a success,” explains Susanna.
“The closer I get to this world, the more I like it and discover that I really enjoy sharing what I learn by using these tools every day with others. This is why I started looking for schools and organizations seeking trainers. I found an announcement for the second edition of She Means Business and applied. The Fondazione Mondo Digitale gave me the opportunity to be a project trainer and that was how I started. I was highly committed, and, during the meetings, I shared not only the technical aspects, but also all those related to on-line security and good practices to avoid bad surprises. It has becoming increasingly important not only to know how to use platforms and exploit them to one's own advantage for work and entertainment, but especially how to avoid falling for on-line scams, to protect one's sensitive data, to understand the dangers of the Internet, and to help children and young people who take everything a bit too lightly.”
When did you begin working with Project “Fully Enjoy the Internet”?
I started working on the project in 2020, in the most difficult year, that of the pandemic. When the proposal arrived to be a Fully Enjoy the Internet coach, I don't think twice, especially when I discovered that I would meet children. I'm a mother and I know that one day I will have to let my daughters use a device. And not knowing how to protect them terrifies me, so I eagerly accepted and discovered many new things, especially through the meetings with the Postal Police. I appreciated the experience and tireless work of all those who work behind a screen to protect us. Together with police officer Giovanni Camarda, we formed a team capable of combining the technical part with the emotional-experiential one, so that both children and young adults could open up, tell us their stories, and ask us for a lot of information. What else can I say? It was a great satisfaction!
How have social media changed? And how did the project develop?
Compared to the first topics, I witnessed a crazy evolution. The feedback from young people, teachers, and parents drove us to update, expand, and further complete the training. With every edition, we added a new piece of information: fact-checking workshops, videos, testimonials, documentaries, all the material made available by Google … In short, we raised the bar every time, receiving in exchange great participation and many satisfied faces (ours first and foremost!) for the excellent work done. Would I choose to do it again? Certainly! Of all the projects I have worked on, this is the one I have followed since the beginning and which I also feel as mine, and not just for the production of the material. I lost count of how many young people I met, but I haven’t forgotten about some particularly impactful sessions, especially when we talked about cyberbullying.
In particular, how can the project be a support tool for civic education?
The project proposal is complementary and supportive to what, in my opinion, should be a mandatory protocol of school education based on five fundamental points: the responsible use of technology, the dangers of the Internet and on-line scams, cyberbullying in all its forms and how to deal with it, dialogue with adults, and, above all, knowing that, in any case whatever happens, there is always a solution and that there are people who can help you without judgment and without punishments. This is the most complete free digital education project I know!
How does the project support educators use the Internet?
Meeting adults I realized that there is a large gap between what we think we know and what we actually know. This is not a criticism, but an observation. Technological tools evolve rapidly and with them everything on the Internet: social media, on-line gaming platforms, blogs, e-shops ... We use them daily and, sometimes, lightly, without realizing that we could run into unpleasant consequences , not only from an economic point of view, but also from a personal one (theft of personal data, identity theft, etc.). Furthermore, we often assume that since children are part of the digital generation par excellence, practically born with these tools, they know how to use them perfectly. Well, that's not the case. They know how to use the platforms, but not with the critical thinking of an adult! This is why it is very important to train and inform oneself firsthand in order to then be able to be a guide and support for your children, grandchildren, and students. This project provides this training free of charge, with expert trainers who have developed practical and immediately usable modules to make sessions active, useful, and fruitful.
According to the latest report by the Postal Police, initial access to social media is taking place at an increasingly early age and cyberbullying is increasing. How can this project, with its resources, counter this situation?
Everything is possible, you just have to find the most suitable formula. It takes commitment and dedication to help kids who, often, driven by friends and fake news, find themselves in situations they don't know how to handle. They must be listened to and guided by transmitting a few, correct concepts, a simple decalogue of what can and cannot be done, overviewing the most delicate settings of their devices and commenting on them together. This is why this is one of the projects that has attracted so many participants over the years. Some schools have even asked us for dedicated meetings for their students, their teachers, and parents over three days. In short, the importance of the project is now a fact, and I would like it to continue to be a point of reference for the Italian school and family system.
What have you learned from your experience with Fully Enjoy the Internet?
I have participated in many training sessions, but one in particular has remained impressed both on me as a coach and on Marta Pietrelli as project officer. It was a meeting with teenagers, close to Christmas, which was supposed to organised together with the Postal Police, but I ended up having to do it alone. The kids opened up like a river flood, outing their experiences, their solitude, all of their innocence and, at the same time, "pride" in the use of devices ... An hour and a half of trust, of requests for help, that left us all shaken and emotionally burdened, yet it is precisely for these intense sessions that the project was designed. They received answers and support. They felt a little less alone and a little more understood. I understood that there is still a lot to do and that as adults we have a great responsibility. They have a future full of opportunities thanks to the Internet (study, work, information) but they will never be able to make the most of this if we are not there as their guide in this phase of their lives.
In short, it’s a project you love ... and for the future?
I had fun, I grew professionally, and I shared a lot of things. The best part has always been the one with the schools in which children and young people know how to make every training session both interesting and unique. I would like to delve even deeper and continue to update the programme modules and hold intensive courses for parents (they are the ones who most need the guidance of the coaches and, alas, the ones with the least free time). I would like an immersive programme, in the truest sense of the word, something that would allow them to identify with what a young person sees, hears, and feels with technology, through errors and the negative aspects of the Internet. Who knows, maybe one day we will meet them all in the metaverse and be able to reach out to everyone in all parts of Italy!
