Both interpersonal interactions and information and communication technologies (ICTs) have played a role in this effort to bridge potential gaps between people. Specifically, the first stage of the project involved directly training 50 participants within 5 individual groups. Media for Development engaged with a representative sample of the GRT community by working with groups composed of English Roma, Irish Traveller, and Slovak Roma on homeschool projects, attending mainstream schools, and being formally excluded from education. The project covered a range of social media techniques, including audio (podcasting), moving image (video blogging), text (blogging), and photography. Organisers catered the type of media to each participant; e.g., training in audio/visual tools was designed to build the communication capacity of those less confident in expressing themselves through writing.

The training culminated in each group of young people producing 2 films about their lives and community, featuring a variety of topics like the bullying and discrimination that young Gypsy Travellers may experience in mainstream education. The young filmmakers then promoted their films by pitching them to the mainstream media, and by placing them on video sharing sites like Fourdocs and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)'s Video Nation. Media for Development claims that "[t]his tangible outcome of the training demonstrated to the young people the power of self-representation and built important links with a wider media world that they had generally perceived to be hostile to them."

To carry the interactions beyond the filmmaking process, Media for Development set up a password-protected social networking site. The rationale behind this site is as follows: "support of social networking as a contemporary means of self-expression and self-representation are increasingly well-documented (particularly amongst a younger audience), but without support and encouragement there is a real risk that traditionally disadvantaged communities will once again be excluded from an ever-changing digital age." Organisers explain that the young people using the site (who number well beyond those who took part in the initial training) are now working in small groups with the collective purpose of producing social media and citizen journalism, making friends, and so on. As of late April 2008, the number of members on the site was over 1,000.

Youth, Education, Rights, Technology.

Media for Development indicates that, "[i]n a recent MORI poll in England, more than one third of adults who took part admitted to being personally prejudiced against Travellers/Gypsies. Such prejudices are frequently re-enforced by the mainstream media, particularly community newspapers published near Gypsy Traveller sites and national tabloids. Within the community young people are amongst the most vulnerable, with all available evidence indicating that their entire experience of education puts them at a disadvantage. Enrolment figures decline over the years in secondary education, with the overall figure enrolled in post-16 courses in England below 20%. With limited access to education and no appropriate forum, the ability of young people to express their ideas and reflect on social trends in their community and beyond is limited. Furthermore, inadequate space on sites has meant that a larger proportion of the Gypsy Roma Traveller community no longer move around and those that do tend to travel for shorter periods and over restricted distances. Undoubtedly this had led to a decline in community cohesion with young people in particular having little on-going contact with their contemporaries in other areas. Also dialogue between the Gypsy Roma Traveller community, particularly between English Roma and Irish Travellers, is limited and can be tense."