What a waste of time and money
The core charter of the Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) is, ‘to secure an effective school workforce that improves children’s life chances’. Very inspiring and important, so how does this relate to the ludicrous Workforce Boredom Index that the TDA’s press office and PR agency have been spruiking to the media?
The index claims that exciting creative industries like advertising are boring and that surprise, surprise, teachers are the least bored professionals and have the highest levels of concentration and absorption in their daily tasks. Dreaming up this index is simply a ploy by the TDA to try and generate some positive press about teaching.
When we spoke to the TDA, their spokesperson waffled on, saying that this would help them stand out in the competitive jobs market. Given the paucity of coverage that will have actually reached their target audience how can the TDA justify the £15k they spent on this exercise?
About the only mainstream media outlets that carried the story were The Scotsman (circulation 70k) and Education Guardian, many of whose readers are teachers. We are not the only ones to dismiss this puffery with ZDnet, the well-respected technology website, describing it as ‘ a highly questionable piece of research’ coupled to a ‘dubious press release’. They went on to write, ‘Whoever thought it up, should perhaps reconsider their own career options!’
The TDA’s pitch is at the opposite end of the scale from research done by Select Education, which showed that 60% of supply teachers planned to stay in the job for another three years but most young full-time teachers say they definitely planned to leave the profession before 40.
The TDA spent £667.5m last year; so wasting £15k hardly seems a substantive issue, but if they really want to attract and retain teachers over the longer term, then being honest about the merits and drawbacks of the profession is far more likely to be successful than wretched PR stunts. The TDA’s senior management team should get rid of the idiots who came up with this idea and start to focus on how to deliver their core charter – more motivated, qualified teachers. A good first step might be to rethink the benefits of having an external media advisor, who every time we have spoken to them can’t answer any questions and simply refer us back to the TDA’s Press Office. Money for old rope, but hardly good value for the application of your taxes!