SWGfL Online Safety Training
Online safety training is crucial in today’s digital age. As technology develops and new risks emerge, it is important to gain the latest advice, resources, and guidance to protect the young people and adults that you work with, along with yourself or anyone who might be in your care. Our variety of training options will equip you to ensure that those around you can experience technology free from harm.
Online Safety for Children & Young People
Our sessions for children are interactive and up-to-date; we talk to young people about the technology they are using everyday. We encourage discussion and involvement. Because of this, we usually seek to keep group sizes to a maximum of 60 children.
A course designed for professionals working with children and young people, to familiarise themselves with the current online safety landscape, covering technologies and the behaviours that develop around them. We will provide an overview of current trends and issues, outlining statutory obligations and signposting towards useful resources.
We do not set a limit on the number attending, but would encourage your governors or trustees responsible for safeguarding to attend. 90-minute virtual session and can be tailored to your needs.
This session will focus on online safety within SEND and special school settings, exploring the unique challenges faced by children and young people with additional needs. We will consider current research and examine key risks, including online exploitation, cyberbullying, and inappropriate content, while highlighting strategies to build digital resilience and promote positive online experiences.
The session will also cover practical approaches for staff to support students effectively, including safeguarding considerations, tailored interventions, and resources designed for SEND learners. Case study examples will illustrate best practice, and there will be a Q&A session for participants to share insights and ask questions. This course is aimed at educational staff, DSL's, SLT and governors. 90-minute virtual session.
Many parents use technology widely today and will worry about what their children do online. Most children will manage their online lives well and build their own coping mechanisms just as they do with real life threats. Despite this, they do often use technology and services in different ways than adults.
This session provides parents with an insight into popular technologies and how young people utilise them. Demonstrating the massive benefits and potential risks, the interactive presentation provides parents and carers with advice, strategies, and resources to help them understand and engage with their child’s online lives in a healthy, positive, and productive way. 90-minute virtual session.
Our 90-minute virtual session will look at the crucial role that Governors and Trustees have in relation to ensuring effective online safety provision in their setting. It will highlight both current and emerging threats in the online safety landscape and examine the range of responsibilities outlined in statutory guidance and the significant safeguarding emphasis placed on the role of Governors and Trustees, including specific responsibilities relating to ensuring effective filtering and monitoring arrangements.
Importantly, the session will provide Governors and Trustees with practical advice, recommendations, and supporting tools based on direct experience of best practice that will support them, and their schools, in ensuring the best possible outcomes for children and young people.
The session will investigate the potential online risks facing children and young people, with a focus on supporting foster carers and the challenges they may face. It will provide carers with an insight into the online world and raise awareness of current and emerging issues, including risks around social media and the potential impact on looked-after children. The training will also examine online behaviours across a variety of ages, topics, and vulnerabilities and will provide carers with practical advice and resources to support them in their vital role in safeguarding the children and young people in their care. 3-hour in-person session.
The Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) plays a pivotal role in safeguarding the children and young people within their care, and as is referenced in the DfE statutory KCSIE guidance, this responsibility includes online safety. As the individual/s holding prime responsibility for safeguarding, this popular CPD offer provides an invaluable opportunity to explore those aspects of safeguarding relating to the online environment. 3-hour in-person course.
Support for professionals working with adults over the age of 18. This training is designed to empower participants by deepening their understanding of intimate image abuse, recognising the signs of exploitation, and learning preventive strategies to safeguard themselves and others in the digital world.
Navigating the digital world can be exciting, but it's important to stay safe while doing so. Our online safety training for young people aged 16+ covers essential topics such as protecting your personal information, recognising and avoiding online scams, keeping safe from intimate image abuse and sextortion, and managing your digital footprint. By participating in this training, you'll gain the knowledge and skills needed to make informed decisions online, ensuring a safer and more positive digital experience. Join us to empower yourself with the tools to navigate the internet confidently and responsibly.
If you are a corporate organisation seeking online safety training, we kindly invite you to contact us. Our organisation champions a "Pay it Forward" ethos, reflected in our practice of applying a higher training price for commercial organisations. This ethos encourages a cycle of generosity and kindness, aiming to create a ripple effect of goodwill throughout a community.
SWGfL use those additional funds to subsidise costs for education, non-profit organisations and community groups who might not otherwise afford our services. This approach not only supports a more equitable access to services but also fosters a culture of giving back and community support.
Boris was absolutely fantastic presenting at our conference. Not only was his content first class but his delivery really engaged the audience and he had such positive feedback. Boris is a credit to your organisation and I would recommend him to all of our partners
Meet the Team
Our expert team includes educators, police officers, academics, school senior leadership and more and together they have created award-winning resources and services produced by SWGfL.
David Wright CBE is CEO at SWGfL and Director of UK Safer Internet Centre; the national awareness centre and part of the European Insafe network. David has worked extensively in online safety for 20 years with children, schools and wider agencies. He advises a number of Governments, organisations and industry partners on online safety strategy and policy and has been appointed as an expert child online protection adviser to the UN ITU.
David has presented at conferences nationally and internationally. He is a member of UK Council for Internet Safety and has recently been invited to be a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Coalition for Digital Safety.
David has led the creation of several Helplines that directly and indirectly support victims of online harm, perhaps most notably the Revenge Porn Helpline in 2015 that supports adults who are victims of non-consensual intimate image (NCII) abuse. Consequentially, David has overseen the development of StopNCII.org, the world's first device-side hashing technology that empowers adults who experience NCII to prevent their images from being shared online
David has led pioneering work, such as the development of multi-award-winning resources, and with Plymouth University, he has published several ground-breaking research reports.
Ken is Deputy CEO and Online Safety Director at SWGfL. He draws on twenty years as a teacher and school leader and ten years as a School Improvement Adviser with Plymouth’s ICT Team.
Ken’s broad canvas of experience has seen him work with a wide range of agencies including the UK government and the European Commission. Ken regularly speaks at conferences around the world. He has been involved in developing multiple resources, frameworks and tools to increase the wellbeing and safety of children and young people when they are online including the multi-award winning 360 Degree Safe online safety self-review tool, the BOOST toolset for children’s settings, and the SEL tools SELMA and ENABLE. His latest work is ProjectEVOLVE, an innovative set of free resources and knowledge mapping to support young people’s online lives, used by 15,500 schools and 70,000 educators in the UK and around the world.
Ron became a founding member of the South West Grid for Learning E-Safety Group in 2005, while Headteacher of Priory Community School, a large secondary school in Weston Super Mare.
In his continuing role as a School Improvement Partner to many Somerset secondary schools, he advises on a wide range of issues, complemented by his role as a school ICT Mark Assessor.
More recently, Ron has held the challenging post of Headteacher of a Virtual School for Looked After Children in North Somerset as well as being invited to manage the council’s 14-19 broadband project.
Boris is proficient in the field of online safety, and he has been working with the European Commission on expert missions to Belarus, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia to present the topic of online safety to government officials, NGO’s and stakeholders. He is also a former member of the Trust and Safety board at Twitter and has advised governments on creating and adopting online child safety policies and best practices under the auspices of ITU Europe. He is a member of the Ad hoc Awareness raising group of ENISA, Chair of the IEEE 7004 Standards for Child and Student Data Governance and has delivered hundreds of presentations on the topic of online safety to various stakeholders.
Kate Worthington is a Senior Practitioner at the SWGfL Revenge Porn Helpline, where she has been a dedicated member of the team since 2018. With extensive expertise in intimate image abuse and online harm affecting adults, Kate is a recognised specialist in her field.
Her work is driven by a commitment to ensuring that the needs and voices of all women are understood and heard, especially those who are often marginalized or overlooked by mainstream society.
Kate has made significant contributions to research on various aspects of adult online harms. She has been involved in studies examining the unique challenges faced by content creators and the specific online harms encountered by rural women in Scotland. Through her research and advocacy, Kate strives to shed light on the diverse experiences of women affected by online abuse, promoting a more inclusive understanding of these critical issues.
In her training sessions, Kate brings a wealth of knowledge and a compassionate approach, empowering participants with the tools and insights needed to address and mitigate online harms. Her dedication to this cause and her expertise makes her an invaluable resource for those looking to understand and combat intimate image abuse and related online threats.
Graham is the Safeguarding Lead Consultant and online safety subject-specialist for SWGfL. Graham has worked across the education sector for over 20 years, supporting schools and organisations to develop and improve safeguarding practice.
As a former Safeguarding Advisor in the North West of England, Graham has broad and extensive experience of working on a child-focussed, multi-agency approach with Schools, Colleges, Safeguarding Partnership Boards, Local Authorities, Police and Health colleagues. Developing safeguarding provision to embrace both the challenges and benefits of new and emerging technologies has been a recurring theme with local and national partners, advising on best practice, self-assessment and audit reviews.
Graham has held a deep and recurring passion for technology and child-centric safeguarding throughout his career. His keen desire to support practitioners to understand the risks and leverage the benefits of the online environment is an ever developing and constantly evolving aspiration.
Jess McBeath is a specialist in online safety with a focus on empowering digital citizens: we should all be able to live a good life online. Jess provides digital self-defence training for different groups, as well as digital safeguarding training for professionals. She supports public services to embed digital safeguarding by design, as well as risk-assessing services and products to help organisations create safer digital experiences.
Gareth is an online safety consultant who writes content for a number of SWGfL educational projects, as well as delivering educational sessions in schools across the UK on behalf of SWGfL and independently. He is an experienced primary teacher, father of three, and a former school governor, as well as an accredited 360 Degree Safe Assessor. Gareth also previously worked as part of the education team at Childnet International, one of the partners in the UK Safer Internet Centre, alongside SWGfL
When it comes to online safety, he is particularly interested in young people’s use of new and emerging technologies, the possible impact of technology and the internet on mental health and the challenge of supporting young people with special educational needs to safely navigate and enjoy online services.
Ed Oleszko, Online Safety Consultant
Simon Lewis has developed his passion for online safety from his work as a primary school teacher in Devon for over 20 years. The varying responsibilities from this time; Safeguarding team member, Data Protection Officer, Computing subject lead, IT technician and governor have given him a wealth of experience and knowledge.
As a customer of SWGfL for many years, Simon has used many of their products and training to support pupils and staff in school.
Traci is an accomplished Online Safety Consultant with over 14 years of experience delivering training, consultancy, and workshops. As a consultant for the UK Safer Internet Centre, she has collaborated on prominent projects like ProjectEVOLVE, ProjectEVOLVE EDU, and the Harmful Sexual Behaviour (HSB) Support Service. She is also a 360 Online Safety Mark assessor.
Traci is an active member of the UK Council for Internet Safety and actively contributes to the Vulnerable Users Subgroup. She authored the 'Principles for Social Workers in Childrens Social Care' and 'Principles for Residential Care Workers'—guidelines hosted on the Internet Matters and .gov websites.
A founder of the Association of Adult and Child Online Safety Specialists, Traci is also the Chief I-venger, where she leads a peer-led digital leaders programme aimed at empowering young people in their online lives. Her dedication to working with SEND (Special Educational Needs and Disabilities) schools inspired her to develop the i-vengers Special Agents, a tailored digital leader programme for special schools.
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