{"id":759270,"date":"2026-06-25T11:49:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T11:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/759270\/"},"modified":"2026-06-25T11:49:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-25T11:49:10","slug":"more-relevant-than-making-fires-explorer-scouts-launch-badges-for-ai-and-digital-age-scouts-and-scouting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/759270\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018More relevant than making fires\u2019: Explorer Scouts launch badges for AI and digital age | Scouts and scouting"},"content":{"rendered":"

Scouts are introducing badges in content creation, digital communication and online safety after consulting nearly 3,000 teenagers who said they wanted skills to help them navigate a world increasingly shaped by AI, social media and digital technology.<\/p>\n

The new Explorer Scout badges, part of the Scout movement\u2019s first major overhaul in almost 25 years, will require 14- to 18-year olds to explore how digital communities shape opinion, create online campaigns, investigate digital footprints and design toolkits to help others stay safe online.<\/p>\n

Ministers, schools and parents continue to debate whether children should face tighter restrictions on smartphone and social media use, including proposals for a ban on social media for under-16s.<\/p>\n

Elie Mondah: \u2018It\u2019s key to modern life.\u2019 Photograph: Martyn Milner\/Martyn Milner\/The Scouts<\/p>\n

Among the new badges is a content creation award, which asks young people to explore how digital communities can influence change, create content intended to positively influence their communities and develop digital storytelling projects.<\/p>\n

A communication badge includes modules on digital footprints and the impact of social media and digital communication, while a personal safety badge requires young people to design resources to help others manage online risks.<\/p>\n

Andrew Thorp, a Scout leader involved in developing the programme, said the changes reflected what young people themselves had asked for. \u201cThe programme for Explorer Scouts has not been overhauled for nearly a quarter of a century,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat was really clear is that young people want to be able to get skills that will help them in their lives going forward, and they want to find a place to belong.\u201d<\/p>\n

The movement\u2019s approach reflected the changing realities of young people\u2019s lives, he said. \u201cNext year, we\u2019re 120 years old. When Scouts started there were different pressures, different motivations. Life was very different. It taught young people how to do things in a way that was relevant to their lives then.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, clearly these kinds of skills are super relevant. With the development of AI, that will become more and more part of all of our lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

The organisation said guidance for the badges would be updated if necessary when the government introduced restrictions on social media use by younger teenagers. He said young people aged 14 to 16 would be reminded not to use social media to share material they created if such a ban came into force.<\/p>\n

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Ethan Watkins: \u2018School isn\u2019t educating us about it.\u2019 Photograph: Martyn Milner\/Martyn Milner\/The Scouts<\/p>\n

But Thorp suggested the debate risked missing the point. \u201cThis is about giving people skills for the future,\u201d he said. \u201cWe focus on creating and understanding content rather than simply publishing it online.\u201d<\/p>\n

For many teenagers involved in the programme, that distinction matters.<\/p>\n

Elie Mondah, 17, from Romford, said: \u201cThese badges are great because we\u2019re not learning about the positive side of AI at school; it\u2019s all about the dangers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese new badges are more relevant than the traditional ones for camping and making fires, because it\u2019s key to modern life,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Ethan Watkins, 14, from Staffordshire, said the new badges would help fill a gap in what young people were being taught elsewhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a really good idea to integrate all the new ideas around AI into the Explorer badges because school isn\u2019t educating us about it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAI is going to be a massive part of my work and education, and so it\u2019s really important for me to learn to use it effectively and safely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thorp said Scouting\u2019s role was to teach young people not just how to use new technologies but how to use them responsibly.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really important that young people know how to use this stuff safely,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not just about learning how to do something, it\u2019s about how to do things safely, how to keep them safe in those environments.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the same way that Scouts teach young people how to light a fire safely, it\u2019s important that you take that same approach to things like content creation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Scouts are introducing badges in content creation, digital communication and online safety after consulting nearly 3,000 teenagers who…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":759271,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[256,254,255,64,63,105],"class_list":["post-759270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=759270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/759271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=759270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=759270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=759270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}