The BBC’s new senior schools outreach manager, Margaret Burgin, sets out her vision for BBC staff and young people working together on School Report News Day and beyond. 6e6q2u

‘I ionately believe that we need to listen to the voices of our younger audiences so that we have an audience in the future’

I am always struck by the fresh ideas and sheer energy young people bring to the news agenda. 

It all started for me in local radio at BBC Radio Sheffield where we hosted a “radio station” for the Sheffield Children’s Festival which featured young people who produced and presented their own programmes. 

There were lighter features, too - a satirical soap called Jarvis Cocker Street and a precursor to something like The Apprentice where the regular presenters at BBC Radio Sheffield were fired one by one. This project thrived, and we even did an exchange with South African schools for the Africa Season in 2004.

When News Action decided to pilot the schools project which eventually became School Report they invited me to an ideas day with other BBC staff with experience of working with schools – a really exciting day with like-minded colleagues.

Since then, I have done a number of BBC projects that have involved children and young people producing content; from schools versions of Dragon’s Den and Waterloo Road to projects with the  BBC Philharmonic, BBC Learning  and Blue Peter. I’ve also volunteered for School Report and I have never lost the sense of exhilaration which comes from working with groups of young people, who come up with fresh new ideas and ways of working.

School Report is now in its 11th year. When it started in 2005 the iPhone was in ‘secret’ development, YouTube was launching its first video, and Facebook’s then 5.5m s were restricted to high school and college students. Crucially, in 2005 only 15% of the world’s population was connected to the internet. It’s nearly half now and projected to be at two-thirds by 2020. Our generation of School Reporters aged 11 – 16 in 2017 have never known a world without the internet and all that it brings.

The other reason I love School Report is that it gives us the opportunity to help young people negotiate an increasingly complex media world. In recent weeks, for example, the world is beset by stories about fake news. As we now work with around a quarter of the UK’s secondary schools and reach over 60,000 children, we have a real opportunity to make a difference. We can give young people the tools to check their news and work out whether it may be accurate or not.

School Report has become a partnership between BBC News, BBC Academy, BBC Children’s and BBC Sport. This gives us a new framework with extra expertise. We have all the Academy experience in journalism training and the BBC Outreach expertise of staff volunteering. We have worked with Children’s to produce our er, and Sport to curate content for our My Team initiative.

And, of course, all of the News experience of School Report content over the last 10 years.

This year for News Day we have a focus on the mental health of young people, and that will be the subject of an event in London. Across the country at least 400 School Reporters will come in to BBC buildings in Northern Ireland, Wales, Birmingham and Norwich.

In Salford, March 16th is a Big Digital Day with groups of pupils from schools across the north curating web content, making their own reports and finding out more about how to create digital content. We want as many staff as possible to meet our 11 – 16s so we know what their lives are like. We are also planning a few surprises for staff which might include a quiz to see who could a 2017 GCSE exam!

The other great thing about School Report is BBC mentors who work in schools and BBC volunteers who help on News Day. Volunteering is a win-win for everyone. Staff get to meet an underserved audience of 11 – 16s and to take that knowledge back to their departments. It helps career development.

School Report is a universal project. We have a complete variety of schools g up, including independent and special schools, to reflect the UK population of 4.3m 11-16 year-olds as accurately as possible.

Following News Day, BBC Outreach will concentrate on the 11 – 16s audience, so that as well as School Report outreach, our staff volunteers can choose to encourage STEM subjects in school, or to become a School Governor, or run an employability workshop in a school.

BBC Outreach & Corporate Responsibility brings the BBC closer to its audiences - particularly those audiences we have identified as harder to reach - with face-to-face activity, community and staff volunteering.

BBC School Report is a partnership between BBC Academy, BBC News, BBC Sport, and BBC Children’s - it gives thousands of 11-16-year-old students in the UK the chance to make their own reports for a real audience, using lesson plans, BBC learning materials, and the help of BBC mentors.

Josie Verghese works in secondary schools with young people and teachers - preparing them BBC News School Report, for The Pitch and the project's annual News Day. She is encouraging more BBC staff from across divisions to volunteer their skills.

'We all have transferable skills to bring to School Report volunteering, and that's an important message for the young people, too'

The best bit of my job is going in to schools and working with young people - they never fail to surprise me and I really value stepping out of the BBC bubble and meeting our audiences.

My visits are to find out what they want to get out of taking part in School Report and show them that it's all possible.

I didn't begin my career as a journalist or working with young people. I was a secretary and PA at the beginning; I've worked at Children's and Sport; I took my NCTJ journalism qualification when I was part of the Newsround team, It's important to point out that you start somewhere and your career is a journey. And sometimes you don't know where it's going to take you!

Often when you visit a school you become the VIP in the context of being from the BBC so it's important to reflect the different roles and departments - to help them past thinking that it is only about being on television.

They often haven't thought that we have lawyers, people working in finance, coders and project managers, for example. Career options and aspirations seems to be an increasing focus for many schools and so sharing my story has become an integral part of my conversation with students.

During my visits, I get them talking about what they think news is, and learning about this is good intelligence for me and my School Report and wider BBC News colleagues. I am there because I want to gauge what they know and what they want from us, as well as find out what is on their news agenda - what the current classroom currency is and what they care about.

I try and always keep it informal - sitting in a circle not with students behind lines of desks - so they don't think I'm some corporate person or this is another boring school thing. Teachers love that School Report is about team work, so when we've warmed up I'll ask a young person to take notes and, if appropriate, someone else to take photographs, and someone to work on some quotes from the session. This means the teacher has then got something to follow up on with them on once I'm gone.

I've said they always surprise me, but I'm no longer so surprised that the BBC isn't the first place that this age group looks for news and stories. Social media is an integral part of their world.

Popular subjects with them when they get warmed up are crime and we work on how this is relevant to them - for example feeling safe in their neighbourhood and in their lives; or the education system and their experience of the changes to it; and needless to say it is rare not to hear about how much they love vloggers, YouTubers and celebrities.

Mental health and wellbeing seems to be increasingly popular in a broader sense too - from anti-bullying and cyber bullying to annoying siblings; from exam stress to body image.

We look at how stories are all around them - with me reminding them often they are the story and news isn't always something 'other'. I worked with a group talking about sport and they didn't seem that excited about it until one of the boys revealed he is a karter and has this ion and hobby and they realised they had a story under their noses.

My role is to work with them as a journalist, and once we get warmed up they love a bit of industry jargon to add authenticity and realness to their reporting activities - for example when we start story-development they love the idea of a news peg. It gives them something tangible to work on and start investigating, if only relating to an event due to happen at their school.

They also often start to see personal stories, events and things happening in their communities with that in mind.

I like to help them see that news isn't something other - it's not what someone else makes and it's not just about someone else - I want it to be more about them, relevant to them, and with them.

School Report has a broader responsibility around media literacy. I find that even teachers won't necessarily question sources of news let alone the young people. If something is on Facebook or comes from something branded, they'll trust that it is true and real - as soon as something is from a big band it's perceived as the truth.

So, when I can I will also work with the groups on thinking about the source of a particular story, who has written something and looking at whether it is balanced and what the agenda is of the author.

This may not sound like rocket science but I think we often forget that we live and breathe the media landscape, story-telling - and schools don't!

You don't need to be a BBC journalist to volunteer with BBC School Report. We all have transferable skills to bring to School Report volunteering, and that's an important message for the young people, too.

And you can be a remote mentor - from your desk - being a sounding board for a teacher running the project in his or her class. We have this model because we know not everyone can get out from behind the desk in their role at the BBC but they still want to be involved in media literacy.

You can encourage them to realise their ambitions. We've had School Reporters interviewing Mark Carney, Angelina Jolie, Malala, the last three Prime Ministers and too many sportspeople to mention. It's true that sometimes the BBC brands helps to open some doors when young people ask for an interview.

But I hope it is also true that by meeting someone in person who works for the BBC they realise that it isn't all showbiz, remote and just what they see on the TV or iPlayer. Rather they can be part of it - whether by sharing a story idea through School Report or perhaps pursuing a future media career.

BBC School Report is a partnership between BBC Academy, BBC News, BBC Sport, and BBC Children’s - it gives thousands of 11-16-year-old students in the UK the chance to make their own reports for a real audience, using lesson plans, BBC learning materials, and the help of BBC mentors.

BBC Outreach & Corporate Responsibility brings the BBC closer to its audiences - particularly those audiences we have identified as harder to reach - with face-to-face activity, community and staff volunteering.

Kalpana Boodhoo always knew she wanted to be a radio journalist. Now she's helping to inspire teenagers into a career in broadcasting.

'I want to inspire the younger generation, and make them realise that a career in journalism is very much achievable'

I have been a Broadcast Journalist for the last 13 years and 2017 will be my fourth year as a BBC School Report Mentor. As part of my day-to-day job at BBC Hereford and Worcester, I read the news, produce programmes and report on the biggest stories in our region.

When I was at school, I knew I wanted to work in radio, but I had absolutely no idea how I would go about achieving that dream. I did various things like record my own radio shows on my cassette player in my bedroom and volunteer for the student newspaper, but I didn't know anyone who worked in radio to find out what working in broadcasting was really like.

This was my main motivation for becoming a BBC School Report mentor. I wanted to inspire the younger generation, and make them realise that a career in journalism is very much achievable, and hopefully giving them some of the skills to set them on their way.

The first school I worked with was Trinity High School in Redditch. They had never done BBC School Report before, and seeing the enthusiasm from both the pupils and the teacher was so exciting.

They were all brimming with ideas and keen to tell stories that reflect their own lives, whether that be bullying or the pressures of exams. I was keen to help them develop these stories and turn them into radio. They continue to be part of BBC School Report.

Whenever I work with a school, I make School Report News Day part of BBC Hereford and Worcester's output. I will take the Radio Car to the school in the morning during the Breakfast Show, and do live reports throughout the day, so listeners can follow their progress.

I will also get some of the young reporters to read news bulletins, do the weather and the sport live on the radio.

It's not only great experience for the school, but it gives us as a station the opportunity to hear from some of the younger voices in our community and find out about the issues that are really important to them. We have also had BBC School Report pupils go on to apply for work experience with us.

I spend about three months working with a school leading up to School Report News Day. I will give informal lessons on how to find news stories, then help reporters develop their stories and secure interviews.

BBC School Report has given me the chance to get out and meet some of the younger people living in Herefordshire and Worcestershire and give them a voice on the BBC. I've enjoyed helping them share their stories and give them the skills and the s they need if they ever choose to pursue a career in broadcasting.

BBC School Report is a partnership between BBC Academy, BBC News, BBC Sport, and BBC Children’s - it gives thousands of 11-16-year-old students in the UK the chance to make their own reports for a real audience, using lesson plans, BBC learning materials, and the help of BBC mentors.

BBC Outreach & Corporate Responsibility brings the BBC closer to its audiences - particularly those audiences we have identified as harder to reach - with face-to-face activity, community and staff volunteering.

Duncan Kirkhope’s enthusiasm for journalism was sparked by the visit of a reporter to his school nearly 40 years ago. Nowadays he tries to repay that debt by being a School Report mentor.

'School Report students question the First Minister with the skill and confidence of political correspondents'

I was about 13 or 14 years old when a journalist from the Dundee Courier daily paper came to a careers event at my school. This chief reporter was enthusiastic about his work as a journalist and said it was a career which could open doors to many varied, interesting and exciting opportunities.

Now, after more than 35 years working for newspapers and BBC News, I still believe that to be true.

It’s probably harder for a young person to embark on a journalistic career nowadays than it was for me at the age of not quite 17 in the early 1980s. But I still like to think that anyone, from whatever background - if they combine enthusiasm with effort - can still achieve that goal.

Certainly many of the School Report students I have had the pleasure of working with over the last five or six years have had these qualities. One 14 year old whom I , practically ran out of the classroom to do an extra interview when I suggested one more quote would provide the final balance to an otherwise great piece of news writing.

I have taken School Report students to the Scottish Parliament to question the First Minister which they did with the skill and confidence of political correspondents. Young people I have worked with have presented their journalism live on the BBC News Channel. One group’s School Report project was judged so good, they were chosen to interview the Deputy Prime Minister at Number 10.

Being a School Report mentor needn’t be a huge time commitment. I did have a request once asking if I could pop along to a school, give the students some ideas, help them film a feature and then edit it for them....

But I believe School Report is more about young people finding their own stories that they want to tell. Then it’s the mentor’s role to help them take their work to the standards of BBC journalism.

Working with young people reminds me what an interesting job being a journalist is. Sometimes I forget that, too caught up in the hectic daily schedules of a busy newsroom. It rekindles the enthusiasm I had as a teenager starting out.

If I can interest a young person in journalism, who may have thought such an opportunity wasn’t open to them, then that would be a great achievement. It would also repay a debt to that enthusiastic journalist who came to my school nearly forty years ago.

BBC Outreach & Corporate Responsibility brings the BBC closer to its audiences - particularly those audiences we have identified as harder to reach - with face-to-face activity, community and staff volunteering.

BBC School Report is a partnership between BBC Academy, BBC News, BBC Sport, and BBC Children’s - it gives thousands of 11-16-year-old students in the UK the chance to make their own reports for a real audience, using lesson plans, BBC learning materials, and the help of BBC mentors.

Sharon Stokes sets out her vision for BBC School Report and the exciting developments for its eleventh year.

'We need to engage better with young people, and School Report is at the centre of that'

I have a confession to make. Until I took the job as head of School Report I’d never worked on the project before. I’d never volunteered to be a mentor or got involved with news day, apart from running a piece on a programme I was producing.

So why, after almost 17 years in the BBC, have I got involved? And why do I think other people should too – especially if they never have?

I was a teenager when I decided I wanted to be a journalist, after doing a week’s work experience on my local newspaper. I’ve always loved story-telling and meeting people, and finding out about their lives.

I’ve spent much of my career in radio – and have a real ion for personal stories. It’s real people that make news interesting.

Apart from being a journalist, I'm mum to a 14 year old and a 12 year old. Like most people their age they are never off their phones – yet never make a phone call! They’re the generation of Snapchat and Instagram, of ing and ing, and even creating their own content.

If I’m honest, they consume very little BBC content (although BBC Sport and Radio 1 still cut through with them both). They’re not unusual for their age.

We know the BBC needs to reach more young people. So how does the BBC engage this generation with our news content?

For the past 10 years School Report has engaged with thousands of 11-16 year olds. It’s a project which gives them a voice and helps to develop their skills. One the BBC’s objectives for this year, set by Director General Tony Hall, is to transform what we do for younger audiences.

And this is a particularly exciting time to engage with this age group. As I say, they don’t just consume content digitally – they create it too. They have plenty to say about the world they live in and the things affecting their lives, and they have stories to tell.

In every department I’ve spoken to since taking this job – they all know they need to engage better with young people. And I see School Report’s future as being at the centre of that. To help engage even more youngsters we’ve made some exciting changes to the project.

Firstly it is now year-round. We’ll be actively seeking stories from young people and engaging them in our content and big editorial moments throughout the school year – starting now.

We’re also opening up School Report so individual children can send us their stories ideas, outside of school. To help us to do this we are creating a School Report er so from next month young people, and schools can send us their ideas directly – as text, video from their phones, audio or pictures.

Later this year we are launching “School Report - The Pitch”. We’ll be inviting schools and young people to send us stories they feel are relevant to their lives, but they feel the BBC isn’t telling. These will be put before a of editors from programmes across the BBC who will each commission a story for their output, and work with that young person to bring their story to our audiences.

So why get involved in School Report? Because it’s all about finding amazing stories, inspiring a new generation and engaging them in what we do – while learning something from them. These youngsters are our future audience – and they could be our future colleagues. You might just help inspire another teenager to embark on a career in the media.

 

Read about BBC School Reporters meeting the Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, in a blog by the BBC's economics editor Kamal Ahmed and about Mark Carney's toughest day, on the BBC news website.

BBC Outreach & Corporate Responsibility brings the BBC closer to its audiences - particularly those audiences we have identified as harder to reach - with face-to-face activity, community and staff volunteering.

Volunteering as a school governor is rewarding and stretching, as James Coatsworth explains.

'Coming from the outside world I was able to help them with different thinking and different approaches'

I never thought that one day I'd be grilled by an Ofsted inspector, but there I was on my way to work for the BBC in audience research for News in London when the call came that tomorrow I was expected to be interviewed by one.

I was the deputy chair of governors at a state primary school in a London borough and discovered it's true that Ofsted announces its visit with little time to prepare - I was nervous.

They ask really probing questions - not just to the head and teachers, but to governors, too - you need to know your school. I drew on my experience of BBC interviews, and I ed the 'exam'. We all felt proud when we learned our result was good with points towards outstanding.

The main thing that encouraged me to become a school governor was volunteering in the 2012 Olympics. I really enjoyed doing something for the local community - so becoming a school governor seemed to make so much sense.

A friend recommended I go through the BBC Outreach school governor matching scheme and was successful at the second school I applied for. I did my homework on them, reading their website and their previous Ofsted report.

When I was appointed there was training and I think I brought to the role the analysis, rigour and project management that I use at work.

It's like enlightening curiosity. I was able to ask what some might think are stupid questions - but I learned there is no such thing, and I was possibly asking at meetings what others felt less able to ask.

I found it fascinating. Thoroughly enjoyable and I did three years - ing shortly after the arrival of new headteacher. I began with a sense of change coming in that I was part of.

I was probably their youngest governor, and when I was elected deputy chair I was so proud.

Coming from the outside world I was able to help them with different thinking and different approaches. The governing body I ed developed to become a shrewder operation.

There was one matter where the head teacher wanted to achieve something but was not making any progress because the other party was not responding. At the BBC I wasn't used to this so I suggested doing a few things to cut through and within 24 hours they had an answer.

A pilot project to make videos for parents to help with maths homework has become business as usual.

And I was on the interview for a new clerk who has turned out to be a star.

I don't have children and it wasn't an issue. It's really important for schools to have independent governors - not biased, not with children at the school, and not a vested interest - like BBC impartiality.

There is a responsibility that you can't take lightly, but for most it is a positive experience.

What I'd say to BBC staff is that you are valued for your skills and experience. It's good to have interesting things outside your work life - something else important to focus on. Plus, I got about the BBC at every meeting!  

At work in the BBC I've drawn on things from being a school governor.

I work in Salford now and I'm hopeful that I'll be able to another school and continue to put something back.  

The BBC s its staff to share their experience and leadership skills to serve as school governors and help communities. 

BBC Outreach & Corporate Responsibility brings the BBC closer to its audiences - particularly those audiences we have identified as harder to reach - with face-to-face activity, community and staff volunteering.