Trust is built through repeated, careful and respectful human interaction. In civic education, this matters because people are often asked to speak about public issues that are also personal: belonging, rights, exclusion, conflict, health, identity, memory, and participation. Digital storytelling offers one structured way to support this work.

This NECE Campus session introduced digital storytelling as a participatory method for civic educators, facilitators, researchers and civil society practitioners. The session focused on how personal stories can help people speak from lived experience, make sense of complex issues, and contribute to public understanding without losing ownership of their own words.

The session began with a discussion of what builds trust in educational and civic spaces. Participants pointed to time, respect, transparency, collaboration, listening, kindness, play, and the ability to express one’s views. These are also central conditions for digital storytelling. The method depends on a carefully held process in which participants decide what story they want to tell, how they want to tell it, and who should hear it.

The session then introduced the digital storytelling methodology developed by the StoryCenter in Berkeley, California, associated with Joe Lambert and the Center for Digital Storytelling. In this approach, participants create short videos, usually two to four minutes long, built from their own voiceover, images and, where appropriate, music. The final video is only one part of the process. The main value lies in the work of identifying a meaningful moment, writing the story, recording it in one’s own voice, and sharing it within a facilitated setting.

A core point of the session was the importance of authorship. In many civic, educational or institutional contexts, people’s experiences are translated into reports, case studies, advocacy messages or professional language. Digital storytelling asks participants to stay close to their own language and their own interpretation of experience. This matters especially when working with groups whose lives are often described by others: patients, young people, marginalised communities, people affected by conflict, or people living with social stigma.

The session also examined why stories can build connection and trust. Research on storytelling was discussed, including work on how listeners respond to emotionally resonant narratives. The aim was not to treat storytelling as a communication shortcut, but to understand why carefully supported personal testimony can help people recognise experiences that might otherwise remain abstract or hidden.

A practical case study showed how this method can be used in public health and advocacy. The “Ready to Talk” project, developed with the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Reproductive Health, supported people with lived experience of heavy menstrual bleeding to create digital stories. One story shared during the session described the isolation, shame, confusion and lack of support that can accompany a common but under-recognised health condition. These stories have since been used with researchers, clinicians and policymakers, including in advocacy spaces connected to women’s health.

For civic educators, the relevance is clear. Digital storytelling can support learning processes in which people are treated as authors of their own experience. It can help groups move from general discussion to concrete testimony. It can also produce materials that continue to support education, awareness-raising and advocacy after a workshop has ended.

The session closed with a practical exercise. Participants were invited to reflect, write, share in pairs and consider how the method could be adapted to their own facilitation contexts. This reflected one of the central principles of the approach: storytelling requires structure, care and consent. It is most useful when the process protects the dignity of the person telling the story.

The video recording of the session is available below.

Speaker

Lily Asch is a storyteller, facilitator and community manager on a mission to use story as a tool for trust, connection and civic life. For over 10 years she has built and led communities, designed transformative learning experiences, and held powerful group spaces across sectors; tech, social enterprise, mental health, intercultural dialogue, leadership development and innovation. Formally trained in digital storytelling, she designs projects whose ripple effects have reached across the globe, even to Scottish Parliament and the NHS. She is also an oral traditional storyteller and former social entrepreneur. She previously founded Real Talk, a social enterprise dedicated to mental health storytelling, and currently works across a portfolio of mission-led organisations. Learn more at: https://www.lilyasch.com