MOLA- Model for Opinion Leaders’ Onlien Activation

The model for opinion leaders` online activation – MOLA is developed from HESED for ACTIon. The model is an adapted from Cair`s Popular Opinion Leader (POL) model developed for HIV prevention. MOLA is an adaptation of POL: here, Opinion Leaders are identified and trained to influence the health-related behavior and attitudes of their friends and peers online. Through implementing this model, organisations and youth workers can:

  1. first empower popular Opinion Leaders (OLs) to become critically engaged consumers of online information and participate in digital media in wise, safe, and ethical ways (training- 5 sessions of 120min each, spaced out over a period of 5 weeks),
  2. and then, through the OLs’ social networks, change the attitudes and behaviors related to a specific health topic within the targeted community as a whole (guided activation of the Opinion leaders phase (12 weeks).

MOLA was designed to be implemented over a period of 5 months. However, both the time frame and the specific content of the programme can be adapted flexibly to a range of different contexts.

DigiPAC- Digital Participation and Active Citizenship

This training programme, DigiPAC (Digital Participation and Active Citizenship), was developed by the project’s coordinator – nexus, a German social research institute that specializes in citizen participation.[1]

The overarching aim of the programme is to help young people – the aim of the accompanying handbook is to enable instructors from educational settings to implement the programme and thus take steps towards this goal with the young people in their groups / under their care. DigiPAC is aimed at youths between 14 and 25 years of age. It is built up of three separate modules, each of which contains 4-6 separate activities[2]. These activities convey various digital and democratic competences. Each module has a slightly different focus, and builds upon the previous learnings:

Module A aims to introduce to the training programme, basic rules, and to explore general themes of being and interacting online.

Module B aims to deepen the participants’ understanding of digital citizenship, democracy and core civic principles.

Module C aims to introduce the participants to the theme of digital youth participation and presents tools for active self-organised peer e-participation.

The DigiPAC programme handbook serves as an easy-to-use guideline for the implementation of the programme, and is aimed at professionals who wish to implement it with a group of young people – teachers, youth workers and more. It contains a short introduction to the ACTIon project, the theoretical background and learning objectives of the programme, and – most importantly – the programme itself.

Readers receive…

  • An overview of the programme’s overall structure
  • An overview of the three separate modules
  • A detailed presentation of each activity

The programme is designed to be implemented over a span of three days – one day for each module; however, the time frame can also be adapted to the demands of each specific learning environment.

This flexible design should allow for a broad application of the programme – to informal and formal learning environments; to youths from a variety of social backgrounds.

We hope that this handbook and programme can help many youths to become critically engaged digital citizens and empower them to use the digital world – an increasingly important part of society – to actively participate in their community and society at large.