The day has finally arrived, bringing with it a wave of youthful journalistic ambition as BBC News School Report 2013 gets officially underway. Around one thousand schools across the United Kingdom are taking part in this year’s massive nationwide initiative, giving students the platform to investigate, write, and broadcast the news stories that genuinely matter to them and their local communities.
As part of the ambitious annual project, student-produced reports and live contributions will appear right across the breadth of BBC News services, making their way onto television screens, radio broadcasts, online news pages, and regional news programmes. Now celebrating its seventh consecutive year, the initiative has grown significantly since its modest beginnings, expanding both its geographic reach and its integration into flagship BBC programming.
The scale of this year’s coverage highlights just how far the project has come. School reporters have traveled to Canterbury to witness firsthand the historic enthronement of the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, capturing a major national and religious event through the fresh perspective of teenage journalists. Meanwhile, the project has also returned to the iconic Olympic Park in London, where young reporters are examining the long-term legacy left behind by the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, assessing how the massive sporting infrastructure has impacted the local area and the nation as a whole. These high-profile assignments represent only a fraction of the wide-ranging topics being investigated by students, with the official BBC School Report website providing comprehensive details on the full spectrum of stories being covered throughout the day.
Reflecting on the remarkable growth of the initiative, Helen Shreeve, editor of BBC News School Report, recalled how different the landscape was when the project first launched. It is all a far cry from when we began, she noted, explaining that a small, dedicated team initially started School Report with the simple yet ambitious aim of giving teenagers the opportunity to make the news they thought mattered. Handing over hours of valuable BBC airtime to young, inexperienced students was undoubtedly a nerve-wracking prospect for the production staff involved, but the bold gamble ultimately proved to be an overwhelming success.
In that inaugural year of 2007, the project worked closely with twelve- and thirteen-year-olds spread across approximately 120 schools. Looking back on those early days, Shreeve recalled that what she remembers most vividly from that first year was seeing school reporters featured on the Six O’Clock News. Witnessing those segments made her realize that this unique partnership between schools and the BBC had developed into something far bigger and more impactful than anyone involved could have ever originally anticipated.
Fast-forward to 2013, and the initiative is now able to reach even further than ever before, both in geographical terms and deeper into the core of the BBC’s broadcast output. Demonstrating this unprecedented level of integration, student reporters and producers will be broadcasting live from Radio Foyle in Londonderry, bringing regional voices and stories directly to a national audience. In an even more remarkable milestone, young reporters will also be taking over the production and delivery of Woman’s Hour, the flagship and long-running programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4.
To accommodate the sheer volume of content being produced by the thousand participating institutions, the BBC has made special broadcast provisions. There will be a dedicated School Report Live channel accessible to viewers through the interactive Red Button service. Furthermore, production teams will be continuously updating a live news feed on the official website and through the @BBCSchoolReport Twitter feed throughout the entire day. Organizers are encouraging audiences to follow along with what the school reporters are doing online and to share their feedback and thoughts on the impressive body of work being generated by the next generation of journalists.