Digital Citizenship in Nebraska
Today’s students live, learn, and build relationships in a world increasingly shaped by technology and artificial intelligence. Digital citizenship helps them develop the knowledge, skills, and habits needed to navigate that world thoughtfully, safely, critically, and responsibly.
This page brings together Nebraska’s shared digital citizenship framework, practical resources, professional learning, and opportunities for students, educators, schools, and families.
In this video, Dr. Kristen Mattson introduces digital citizenship as the intersection of technology and humanity, explains the value of a shared statewide approach, and provides an overview of the four strands guiding Nebraska’s work.
Schools across Nebraska are already helping students navigate technology thoughtfully, safely, and responsibly. Developed by Dr. Kristen Mattson and Dr. LeeAnn Lindsey, the Edvolve Digital Citizenship Framework provides a shared language for connecting those efforts and considering digital citizenship as more than a single lesson or technology-related initiative.
The Nebraska Department of Education and the ESU Coordinating Council use this framework to support greater coherence across the state while preserving local decision-making. Schools and districts can apply it according to the needs, priorities, and context of their own communities.
Digital Safety
Students learn to protect themselves and others by understanding digital rules, managing personal data, and recognizing unsafe or misleading online behavior.
Media & Info Literacy
Students develop the skills to search effectively, evaluate information and media for credibility and bias, and create content responsibly.
Digital Well-Being
Students learn to balance their digital lives with their social, emotional, and physical health while navigating relationships and identity in online spaces.
Social Responsibility
Students explore how technology shapes communities and equity, using digital tools ethically and collaboratively to engage, advocate, and contribute to positive change.
These Four Strands Work Together
Real-world digital experiences rarely fit within only one strand. A single situation may involve safety, information literacy, well-being, and social responsibility at the same time.
Artificial intelligence is one example. AI is not a separate fifth strand of digital citizenship. Instead, it introduces new questions across all four strands from privacy and accuracy to relationships, fairness, authorship, and responsible use.
A shared framework becomes meaningful when students, educators, schools, and communities use it to examine real challenges and take thoughtful action. Across Nebraska, digital citizenship is coming to life through student leadership, professional learning, statewide collaboration, and locally developed projects.
Nebraska Digital Citizenship Symposium
At the Nebraska Digital Citizenship Symposium, middle and high school students work in school teams to explore the opportunities, risks, and responsibilities associated with digital citizenship and AI.
Students considered questions involving privacy, trustworthy information, relationships, well-being, and ethical technology use before developing projects, plans, and resources to support conversations in their own school communities. Their work demonstrates how the four strands of digital citizenship can help students examine emerging technologies from multiple perspectives.
Statewide Learning for Nebraska Educators
During the 2026–27 school year, NDE and the ESUCC are excited to host Dr. Kristen Mattson who will lead a four-part professional learning series centered on the Edvolve Digital Citizenship Framework.
Each session will examine one of the framework’s four strands and help Nebraska educators consider how digital citizenship can be integrated into classrooms, schools, and local decision-making.
Webinar Schedule
- Digital Safety: Tuesday, September 1, 2026, from 3:00–3:45 p.m. CT
- Media and Information Literacy: Tuesday, October 27, 2026, from 3:00–3:45 p.m. CT
- Social Responsibility: Tuesday, February 16, 2027, from 3:00–3:45 p.m. CT
- Digital Well-Being: Tuesday, April 27, 2027, from 3:00–3:45 p.m. CT
Participants may attend individual sessions or engage in the complete series to develop a broader understanding of the framework.
Digital citizenship develops over time as students encounter new technologies, assume greater independence, and consider increasingly complex questions about information, identity, relationships, safety, equity, and responsibility.
The collections below are organized by grade level and audience to help educators find age-appropriate lessons, professional learning, research, and conversation supports. Together, they can contribute to a coherent progression of digital citizenship learning rather than a series of isolated lessons or responses to individual technologies.
In the elementary grades, students build foundational habits for using technology safely, purposefully, and with the support of trusted adults. Learning progresses from following technology rules and protecting personal information to recognizing persuasive design, evaluating whether information is trustworthy, communicating with care, and understanding how digital choices affect themselves and others.
Age-appropriate AI literacy begins here as well. Students can learn that search engines and AI chatbots work differently, practice creating useful questions and prompts, check AI-generated information against other sources, and recognize that bots or digital characters cannot think, feel, or care like people do.
As students gain greater independence online, digital citizenship learning should help them move beyond following rules toward analyzing how digital systems influence their choices and experiences. Middle school students can examine data collection, terms of service, scams and synthetic media, source credibility, algorithms, persuasive design, online identity, digital relationships, accessibility, and the broader effects of technology on individuals and communities.
At this level, students can also use AI more intentionally while questioning its limitations. This includes engaging in iterative prompting, verifying AI-generated claims, understanding hallucinations and training data, considering copyright and human authorship, recognizing algorithmic bias, and examining how AI systems can influence information, relationships, equity, and well-being.
High school students are preparing to navigate digital environments with greater personal, academic, civic, and professional responsibility. Learning at this level can invite students to evaluate privacy laws and platform practices, investigate the social and economic forces shaping technology, assess sophisticated forms of deception, examine how media and algorithms influence identity and public understanding, and make informed decisions about how they create, communicate, and participate.
Students should also be prepared to consider the more complex questions raised by AI and emerging technologies. These include evaluating the quality and origins of AI-generated information, using AI as a critical thinking partner without surrendering personal judgment, maintaining voice and transparency in co-created work, examining coded bias and exclusion, and considering who should be accountable for the ethical design, use, and regulation of technology.
Digital citizenship is most effective when educators have shared language, practical strategies, and confidence in how to address digital life with students. These professional learning opportunities can help educators build understanding, connect the framework to classroom practice, and support consistent implementation across schools.
Schools and education organizations may benefit from outside voices who can help deepen local conversations, support professional learning, or guide systems-level planning. The individuals and organizations in this section offer expertise connected to digital citizenship, digital well-being, media literacy, online safety, and responsible technology use.
Inclusion on this page is intended to help educators discover relevant voices and resources and does not represent a formal endorsement of any individual, organization, product, or service.
Strong digital citizenship work should be informed by current research, trusted guidance, and emerging issues in students’ digital lives. These resources can support school leaders, educators, and teams as they explore topics such as online safety, media and information literacy, digital well-being, AI companions, student privacy, and responsible participation in digital spaces.
Digital citizenship does not stop at the school door; students’ digital lives are shaped by what happens at home, in school, and across their communities. These materials can help schools communicate with families and support shared conversations about safety, well-being, media literacy, AI, and responsible technology use.
Quick Links to Edvolve Strands
Resource Disclaimer
Resources and external links on this page are provided for information and convenience and include Nebraska-developed materials alongside selected examples from other organizations, institutions, and vendors. Inclusion does not constitute endorsement, recommendation, certification, or preference by SupportED, NDE, ESUCC, or the State of Nebraska, and this collection is not exhaustive. External content is controlled by its respective owners and may change without notice. Users are responsible for independently evaluating resources and for decisions or actions taken in reliance on them, consistent with applicable laws, local policies, contractual obligations, and community priorities. To the fullest extent permitted by law, SupportED, NDE, ESUCC, and the State of Nebraska disclaim responsibility for resulting decisions, actions, or outcomes.
