School's update - 13/07/12
Do all activities have to happen on one day?
Yes we are planning for all activities to be over 1 day (10th October 2012) to keep it succinct. By holding the event on 1 day we can more easily coordinate the visit of the agency professionals, as well as link the participating schools via the web. Also as the d day challenge work is submitted for judging, it means we can receive them all in one go.
However, if one of your team’s entries is short listed in the competition, they will get the chance to refine it (hopefully with the agency).
For the day we will be creating a video of agency life, our work, careers and routes in to the industry. We will showcase the great stuff we do across web, mobile, apps, TV and gaming. The video will have plenty of breaks so it can be paused, as and when required.
We also envisage the digital professional will give additional 1st hand experience via a Q&A and they will also show some of their agency’s work etc.
We then have the challenge; the students are to work in groups (approx 8) and BIMA will provide all the assets etc. We are defining the 5 challenges now but anticipate they will take approx 3 - 4 hours to do each. Every student group can choose which one they will prefer.
Once we know more we’ll brief all teachers and agencies to what the students will be doing.
Which departments usually participate?
One of our aims is to show the diversity of roles in digital. Our industry has for example: data analysts, copywriters, project managers as well as typical web designers and developers. See the roles page on this site.
However, for speed we are aiming our promotion at teachers across Design and Technology, Art and Design and ICT. This is not exclusive, but it would appear that these subjects have teachers with a lot of enthusiasm for what we are doing.
Teachers - If you're on Twitter follow us at BIMAdday for alerts of updates
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School's update - 12/07/12
When is the closing date for schools to register?
We are officially accepting registration up until the end of term. This will allow us time to pair participating schools with the digital agencies. However, we will have some overlap of agencies and schools, so if you apply past the deadline, we will try and help.
What is the age range?
The day is aimed at secondary school students both at GSCE and A level. We are trying to be inclusive, so will endeavour to tailor the challenges, assets and videos etc to appeal to a 14 – 18 year audience.
How many students can take part?
Some school’s are entering a small group and others are involving a whole year group; it's entirely up to you. All we’d ask is that the students involved, have some interest in digital and our industry!
What size groups?
We are creating the d day challenges for groups of approx 8 students. A school can have as many groups as they wish, and those groups can do the same or different challenges. A challenge will last about 3.5 hours so only one per student on the day.
The first part of d day will be videos, Q&A with the professionals and other assets. These will be designed to be used for a standard class of 30 - 35.
Do I need any equipment?
Access to a PC is going to be needed for the coding and potentially the mobile apps challenge. However, we will ensure that the any project can be undertaken with only 1 – 2 computers per group. In addition, we may need you download some software (we're currently sorting out free perpetual licenses), but this will be explained prior to the day itself. If there are issues with this, we're revise our plans.
Who will come into the schools?
We’ve so far 70 digital agencies onboard. We’re asking them to nominate 1 – 2 staff willing to come into a school for the day. We're asking for staff with good all round experience of our industry. Once we have paired the agency and the school, we can ensure they are prepared and well briefed.
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Update - 06/06/12
Message to participating agencies
As the industry association dedicated to British digital specialists, BIMA is delighted that your agency is helping us with our education initiative. With your assistance we will inspire a younger generation to see the opportunities in UK digital, so that together we can help address the UK’s digital skills shortages at the grass roots.
So far we’ve made a good start and already have 41 agencies on board. You can see your fellow participants in the sponsors’ section.
However, this is not nearly enough to make the day a truly nationwide event. So we are delighted to announce our partnership with The Drum. As the leading industry publication they will be supporting us over the next few months through their magazine and website. In addition, The Drum is also offering a free one-year subscription (worth £176) of the magazine to participating teachers.
To raise awareness for the project in schools, we have partnered with TES (www.tes.co.uk). As the UK’s leading journal and website for teachers, TES is ideal for spreading the word across schools and colleges. Promotion to teachers will start following half term next week.
Once we start receiving expressions of interest from schools, we will begin the process of pairing agencies with local schools. However, if your agency already has an existing relationship with a school and wish to work with them, please let me know.
What we need you to do
1 - Join us on d-day
The day will involve a mix of videos, interaction with the digital professionals (that’s you hopefully!) and the d-day challenge itself. For the challenge, pupils will be able to choose a project from a range of digital disciplines including web, mobile, social media, coding and games design. We’re working on the formats currently with some great partners.
2 - Connect with a local school
We’d like to ask you to send one or ideally a couple of staff into a local school on d-day to provide help, insight and a real-life connection for the students with the digital world.
3 - Final awards – for you too
In addition, if your school’s entry is shortlisted by our judging panel, we’d like you to help your school develop the idea a bit more for re-submission as an entry for the final awards. As a big thank you for this, the agency working with the winning school will win a prestigious BIMA award for their achievement. We’ll send more details on the challenges and agenda for the day as we finalise them.
Bright young stars
Finally, we also want to use d-day to highlight young people who are already forging careers in our industry. We would like the bright young stars who are working for you to help us inspire the next generation. Let us know who they are with an email to sdc@bima.co.uk. We’d like them to tell their stories and tell us all the reasons they love digital in your agency.