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The °®Ç鵺ÂÛ̳ recently hosted the RECLAIM Hackathon, bringing together researchers, creative practitioners, youth organisations, and civic partners from across Europe to explore how young people experience digital environments and how new approaches to digital wellbeing might be developed. Designed as a collaborative workshop, the event aimed to create a space where different forms of expertise including academic research, creative practice, and lived experience could be brought together.

A central and integral feature of the first day was the inclusion of young people themselves. Participants aged 15-26 were invited to take part in a series of collaborative sessions, sharing their experiences of navigating online spaces and contributing directly to discussions about digital wellbeing. In this way, the event sought to foreground their perspectives and involve them in shaping the emerging questions and ideas.

Across the two days, participants worked through a range of activities designed to explore how digital platforms influence everyday life, from collaborative mapping exercises to creative design sessions. These discussions provided an opportunity to reflect on the complexity of young people’s digital experiences and to begin considering how future research might better respond to them.

Day One: Understanding Young People’s Digital Worlds

Following this discussion, participants were invited to translate these ideas into a more tangible and imaginative form through another creative activity. Using a range of materials, including clay, groups were asked to construct their ideal version of a library as a civic space, incorporating the many ideas generated on day one. The session took on a playful, world-building quality, encouraging participants to move beyond existing institutional constraints and instead imagine what a library designed to support young people’s digital wellbeing could be.

Through this process, participants created speculative environments that reflected a wide range of possibilities, from flexible and inclusive spaces for collaboration and creativity to quieter areas for reflection and digital learning. The emphasis on play allowed ideas to develop more freely, supporting experimentation and encouraging participants to think beyond what currently exists toward what might be possible. In doing so, the activity reinforced the value of creative methods in opening up new ways of thinking about the role of civic spaces in supporting healthier relationships with digital environments.

After a day spent unpacking the realities of young people’s digital lives, the focus of the event began to shift. The discussions, activities, and perspectives shared on the first day had generated a wide range of ideas about the pressures and possibilities within digital environments.

The second day of the hackathon invited participants to build on these conversations by thinking more practically about how such insights might inform future research and potential interventions aimed at supporting healthier digital engagement.

Day Two: Building Ideas Together (Lego Lab)

The first session of the day introduced a creative systems-mapping exercise using Lego. Participants worked in small groups to construct models representing the relationships between digital environments, social influences, and potential points of intervention.

Exploring these ideas through Lego fostered a productive environment for idea generation. In a similar way to the earlier Jargon Busting activity, the use of Lego allowed participants to express ideas outside of the constraints that academic language and disciplinary perspectives can sometimes impose. The models encouraged open-minded and creative thinking, enabling participants to conceptualise what healthier digital environments for young people might look like, rather than limiting discussions to what initially seemed practical or possible.

Rather than acting as a standalone activity, these models became the foundation for the discussions that followed throughout the day. As participants shared and reflected on each model, new ideas and perspectives began to emerge, providing a tangible way of thinking through the complexities of digital wellbeing.

As the workshop progressed, these models provided a starting point for developing possible intervention ideas. Participants used the structures they had created to explore where meaningful changes might occur within digital ecosystems, considering how research insights, creative practices, and youth engagement might contribute to supporting healthier digital experiences.

Discussions then expanded to consider how such ideas might be implemented in practice. Participants reflected on how interventions could operate across different cultural and social contexts, and what ethical and practical considerations would need to be addressed when working with young people in different environments.

The event concluded with a final consolidation session in which participants summarised the key ideas that had come to light across the two days and discussed the next steps for developing the project. This session focused primarily on outlining responsibilities and immediate actions following the workshop.

Keeping Young People’s Voices at the Centre

The RECLAIM hackathon created a space for researchers, practitioners, and young people to come together and reflect on the complexities of digital life. Over the course of two days, participants moved from questioning the language used to describe digital wellbeing, to mapping the pressures and possibilities within online environments, and finally to exploring how new approaches might promote healthier, more connected lives for young people.

One of the most important aspects of the event was the central role played by young people themselves. Their contributions ensured that discussions about digital wellbeing remained grounded in lived experience, rather than abstract assumptions about how digital technologies shape young people’s lives.

The creative and collaborative format of the hackathon also highlighted the value of bringing together different forms of expertise. By combining research insights, participatory activities, and open discussion, the event demonstrated how interdisciplinary collaboration can open new ways of approaching complex challenges.

While the conversations that began during the hackathon will continue to develop in the months ahead, the event itself marked an important first step in building a shared understanding of how healthier digital environments might be imagined and created and if the event demonstrated anything, it was that meaningful conversations about digital wellbeing must begin by listening to the voices of the young people who navigate these digital environments daily.