Yorkshire & Humber ITT Network Meeting

26th February 2015

Harrogate Grammar School

1

AgendaTime Session

12.00 Arrival & Lunch 

12.45 Welcome Sue Lewis – Harrogate Grammar School 

1.00 Introductions and outline for the session NCTL updates - School Direct Baljit Birring & Doreen SolesTeaching and Leadership Advisers 

1.15 Focus: Social Media in ITT RecruitmentJoe Hill - Social Media Manager, Teacher recruitment, external engagement division, NCTL Reflection, discussion and actions.

2.15 Focus: Sharing Recruitment Challenges and Successful Approaches.Sue Lewis – Harrogate Grammar Reflection discussion and actions.  

3.15 Future arrangements for the NetworkDate and focus – chair and host 

3.30 Close 

NCTL update

Autumn Term ITT Network meetings

Recruitment update School Direct updates

Update on recruitment Applicant numbers are lower than at this point last year We need more applicants overall in order to meet TSM At this point each year we have around 50% of the total number

of applicants we will get – this trend has not been Schools and providers are making more offers than they did at

this point last year; however, they need to make more offers per place as the applicant pool tails off

A range of additional interventions to support recruitment this year, including: TV advertising (March); award of £5k funding to schools for additional SDS places and additional support to applicants via recruitment advisors

Initial teacher training (ITT) marketing

Advertising in the Daily Telegraph, Times, Guardian, Metro and Evening Standard from Monday 23 February.

TV advertising for the first time since 2010, with the Your Future I Their Future video, featuring Educating Yorkshire’s Mr Burton, being shown for four weeks from 2 March across ITV1, Channel 4, 5 and Sky.

The TV and newspaper advertising will be complemented by additional social media and direct marketing activities, and will encourage attendance at candidate events, including the 14 remaining Train to Teach events across the country.

What are you doing to capture interest locally? 

School Direct Bulletin

UCAS Teacher Training release on applicant numbers www.ucas.com/corporate/data-and-analysis/ucas-teacher-training-statistical-releases

Allocations – opportunity to request additional SD places and extra funding

Funding Marketing and Recruitment

http://www.education.gov.uk/get-into-teaching SEP and SKE Learning from other schools UCAS reminders

Social Media in ITT Recruitment

Joe Hill Social Media Manager, Teacher recruitment,

external engagement division, NCTL

Get Into Teaching: social media

What are the benefits?

Social media marketing has many advantages:Broad reach – social media can reach millions of people Ability to target particular groups – many forms of social media (eg Facebook) allow businesses to target specific groups and/or locationsFree or low-cost – many forms of social media are free, and paid options are usually low-cost and based on paying per click.Personal – social media allows you to communicate on a personal basis with individual customers and groupsFast – you can quickly distribute information to many peopleFeedback – your audience can (and will) tell you how they feel about what you’re sayingEasy – you don’t need high-level skills to participate in social media. The average person with a standard computer or mobile phone should have no difficulty

How we use social media• Our two main outlets are Facebook (100k+ followers) and Twitter (37.5k

followers)

• We also use YouTube and LinkedIn

• We use social media both for ‘organic’ (i.e. free) activity, and as a platform for advertising.

• The paid-for activity in particular forms part of the wider marketing campaign, and serves to encourage aspiring teachers to register with us on the Get Into Teaching website (or at least visit it)

• Facebook is less useful these days for reaching people for free, but is a powerful advertising platform

• Twitter has grown more important for us, especially for supporting and interacting with training providers and aspiring teachers

• YouTube is more important as a place for hosting videos, though there is room for growth

• We launched a LinkedIn page last month

Need to setup social media? Top tipsSome school servers may not allow access to social media accountsInvolve your IT supportCheck with your Local Authority or organisation supporting your ITSome leaders or colleagues aren’t sold on the benefits of using social media, so you may need to sell these:It’s a cheap way to promote your school and once you have interest, it can help you meet your recruitment targetsYour messages are easy for people to share far and wide, 24 hours a day, 7 days a weekYou can get instant feedback and responsesMore and more schools are embracing social media - you don’t want to be missing out!

Already into social media?There are a number ways you can use social media accounts you already have to promote your School Direct places and the majority are low or no cost

Consider using your HEI partners’ social media channels – they may well have a significantly greater reach than you.Follow NCTL and Get into Teaching to get all the latest messages, news and information for you, as well as candidates candidatesUse the Get Into Teaching Facebook page or (especially) Twitter feed to let potential teachers know about any events or newsConsider using LinkedIn further – this is not just a ‘professional’ Facebook-like space, there are large amount of student members using it to find their career path and job vacancies. Could be excellent vehicle for showcasing your School Direct for no or low cost

Getting started with Twitter (1)

Setting up a Twitter account is easy Make sure it’s a distinct account for your partnership, focused on

teacher training (don’t use a pre-existing school account) Use a cheerful image for your cover photo, and your logo for your

profile image In your ‘bio’ make it clear who, what and where you are Link to your partnership website from your profile (and link to your

Twitter from your website too, if possible). Agree in advance who in your partnership should have access to the

account, and who has ultimate responsibility for it. Be careful in sharing access.

Getting started with Twitter (2)

Think about what each tweet is for. E.g. if you’re talking about an open event in your school, include a link or contact number so that anyone interested can respond.

If it isn’t immediately clear from your name where in the country you are, include the location in your tweet too.

If you append your tweet with @getintoteaching, we’ll usually spot the tweet and retweet to our 12k (& counting) followers

Tweet regularly and try to interact with your followers Including pictures, videos or other media is always good

Taking things further Setting up a Facebook page may also be a good idea, especially if you

want to try Facebook advertising. Facebook posts also have a longer ‘life’ than tweets (usually a few hours).

Consider using a social media management service like Hootsuite or Tweetdeck – the basic versions are free and allow different people to post messages with different levels of permissions across your social media

Facebook and Twitter both allow you to ‘look under the bonnet’ and see how effective your posts/tweets have been. Use this info improve your campaign

Social content Content is basically ‘interesting stuff’ – it encompasses visuals,

written articles, videos, podcasts and more. Your most important advocates are very close to home – teachers,

trainees and even students. These people can help to make a persuasive case to your audience that teaching is a great career, and you could be the right training provider

Blogs (hosted on WordPress, Blogger, Tumblr etc.) can be very straightforward to set up and, if done properly, can make for great supporting content. Use images too, if you can

Recording short videos and uploading to YouTube may also work for you

If you include images or videos of children, ensure that you have permission to use them

There’s a blurred line between a content platform and social media. Don’t worry too much about the terminology

More advanced LinkedIn isn’t as straightforward to use but can offer possibilities.

Most students now join LinkedIn when they start uni (though it’s used rather differently to other social media)

Google+’s active user base (stereotypically) overlaps with a STEM audience. It’s more interest-led than Facebook but more flexible than Twitter. Not for everyone, perhaps, but it dovetails will with YouTube and also provides the ‘Hangout’ online events facility, which you might find useful

Other social media include Pinterest, Instagram, Vine, Medium and Reddit. There are also content aggregators such as Paper.li and Storify.

Buying reach You can use Facebook to carry out highly targeted advertising

campaigns at reasonably low cost (e.g. a few hundred pounds). The great strength of Facebook here is the level to which you can

target; for example, you can target to anyone aged 21-50, who holds a degree or higher in your local area

Twitter, because it collects far less information on its users, may well be less effective as a paid-for channel

LinkedIn can be quite expensive, but permits very specific targeting and personalised messaging. This may be useful if you’re having particular difficulty recruiting to a priority subject like physics

Don’t be daunted! ‘Social media’ is exactly what it says – various different types of medium

through which to communicate, each with specific advantages and limitations

The basic rules of communication haven’t really changed for millennia. Cicero’s classic formula for good rhetoric (persuasive communication) – delectare, docere, movere (entertain, inform, persuade) – is as valid for Twitter as it was in the Roman senate

You might worry about ‘trolling’ etc. – this can happen, but is unlikely in this case. Having a clear policy from the outset on dealing with negative responses will help.

Social media is a fluid and evolving field, but the main channels – Facebook, YouTube, Twitter etc. – are likely to remain popular, in the medium term at least. Don’t worry about trying to join the latest trends; instead concentrate on the channels that work best for you.

Contact:Joe Hill, social media manager, NCTL

joe.hill@education.gsi.gov.uk

0161 600 1348

@getintoteaching

Sharing Recruitment Challenges and Successful Approaches.

(Table discussions)

Sue Lewis – Harrogate Grammar 

Reflection, discussion and actions.  

Future ITT meetings

Sub regional and regional sub regional - focusWhen – timeSystem leader networks 27, 29 April; 6,8 July/TSA network meeting 6th May

Where – locationWho – host and chair

Regional ITT network – late Sept? Venue/Host/ a co-ordinating group from all three sub regional networks

Please let us have your feedback