#NotWithoutMe

Vulnerable young people, particularly those at points of transition in their life (unemployed, homeless, in care, in secure accommodation, excluded from mainstream education, seeking asylum), are most at risk of falling outside the digital mainstream and slipping through the net. Although the overall digital divide may be reducing in terms of the number of people who are not digitally engaged, for those who remain excluded the divide is deepening, compounding existing inequalities. The programme's evaluation found that the assumption that young people are inherently 'digital natives' with superior tech skills is not supported by the evidence it generated.

The Carnegie UK Trust set out to develop evidence and test innovative engagement techniques for improving digital skills and literacy among vulnerable young people across the UK, and to better understand how to design and deliver digital-inclusion projects for different vulnerable groups. From 40 applications, four pilot projects were selected and each funded with £10,000 to run from January 2016 to January 2017.

Four organisations delivered distinct pilots over the one-year programme: Signal Film and Media ran weekly digital-storytelling workshops plus one-to-one and outreach sessions with young people in and leaving care, producing short films; The Pavilion used creative digital projects to explore personal journeys, self-confidence and wellbeing; Young Scot and The Prince's Trust Scotland delivered eight co-designed, day-long digital-skills workshops (covering CV-building, online safety and accessing services) reaching 40 young people; and Mencap in Northern Ireland adapted digital-skills content for young people with learning disabilities. Across the four projects, over 80 sessions were run in total, with progress tracked through pre/post self-report surveys and qualitative feedback rather than a comparison group.

The four pilots supported 100 young people aged 11-25 in total (29 through The Pavilion, 40 through Young Scot/The Prince's Trust, 16 through Mencap Northern Ireland, and 15 through Signal Film and Media), running over 80 sessions and producing creative outputs including 11 films/vlogs and 40+ blog posts. Reported skill gains covered online safety, video creation, problem-solving, digital photography, peer working, confidence and safer online behaviours, based on self-report baseline/endpoint surveys and qualitative feedback rather than a comparison group. Staff also found that young people's self-reported digital confidence at baseline often overstated their actual skills, prompting some projects to adapt delivery mid-programme.

The programme's own evaluation report concludes that standard digital-skills measurement tools are not always appropriate for vulnerable young people, recommends combining self-report with other baseline measures, and stresses that adult support networks (carers, foster parents, professionals) also need digital upskilling. Because assessment relied on self-report pre/post data without a comparison group, the reported gains should be read as suggestive rather than causally attributed to the programme.