Holistic, community-led digital safety: shaping ECEC through shared care

In a rapidly evolving digital world, early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings are strengthening how they protect young children online. Rather than rely on isolated strategies, Storypark proposes a community-led, collective framework that puts safety at the heart of everyday practice.

Storypark highlights that traditional cyber‑security models tend to isolate responsibility within small technical teams. This can lead to staff feeling either insecure, “I’m not great with technology” or detached “It’s not my responsibility.” 

Instead, Storypark invites ECEC services to re‑centre digital safety through shared empathy and care. When everyone, educators, leaders, service managers, families, administrators and software partners, participates actively, the approach becomes clearer, collaborative and resilient.

Storypark outlines key domains where digital safety must be shaped communally:

1. Content creation and storage – How content is produced, shared and protected.
2. User management – Who accesses the platform and how permissions are managed.
3. Device management – How hardware is used securely.
4. Digital platforms – The systems and policies that underpin the overall safety infrastructure 

Implementing this involves layering:

• Multiple tools and system features
• Clear, shared policies and procedures
• Ongoing community dialogue and knowledge sharing
• Practical actions and safety‑focused mindsets 

This layered model fosters transparency, everyone knows who does what, why it matters, and how others contribute.

Digital safety becomes robust when everyone is involved. Community‑led approaches:

• Allow gaps in knowledge to be recognised and addressed
• Build confidence in less tech‑savvy participants
• Encourage shared understanding of safety priorities
• Support visible, collective actions instead of siloed responsibility 

In such environments, questions like “What are educators doing?” or “What’s the software doing?” become unnecessary, there’s clear, open awareness and collaboration.

A community-led model for digital safety reflects widely recognised ECEC principles such as empathy, trust and inclusion. When responsibility for safety is shared, digital environments in early learning settings can help protect children and support the whole learning community to act with purpose, clarity and care.

Read the full article and research here.