Catholic College Wodonga recognises this with their responsible digital citizenship values and has taken a step further to link up with Telstra’s Project Rockit.

The initiative, being rolled out across regional Australia, mentors students in navigating social media and cyber bullying.

The project’s head of programs, Caitlin Wood, said her team would deliver more than 40 projects for schools in regional and remote areas across six weeks.

“Statistically speaking, the further you are from a metropolitan city, the higher the cases are of reported bullying,” she said.

“Project Rockit equips young people with strategies and skills to identify bullying online and feel empowered to be able to do something about it.”

Catholic College eLearning coach Shane Piper said a theme of digital responsibility established within the school community three years ago had helped to address a low incidence of cyber-bullying.

“The conversation today is about bullying, but we cover elements including being resourceful and using technology in a productive way,” he said.

“Our major emphasis is on education, rather than a punitive approach.

“When there’s an understanding of the impact, that’s more powerful than negative consequences.”

Ms Wood said it was an approach ‘other schools could learn from’.

“It’s finding the balance between education and empathy,” she said.

“As a whole school approach, it’s so important – you can’t come down from that high level, you really have to sit on the ground with them, figure it out and listen to what it is they need.”

Project Rockit is part of the $500,000 Telstra Kids Fund Digital Futures program.

Program presenter Ash Ball said the sessions had so far received good feedback from the first schools in line.

“We focus on the bystander and that idea of seeing something online and having a choice to do something about it,” he said.

“They can block and report things, but we also give them ways to deal with situations such as if a photo of them is online they don’t want to be there.

“After our workshop in Wangaratta, somebody made the comment that they’d finally gotten the confidence to do something when they see it happening.”

Catholic College year 7 student Bronwyn Wattie, 13, said she wasn’t an avid user of social media but could see the project’s importance.

“It’s about thinking about your actions and how you would feel if it were happening to you,” she said.