Marketing spend on ‘teacher recruitment’: FOI release

You asked:

Regarding the Scottish Government’s marketing spend on ‘teacher recruitment’ mentioned here (Scottish Government, Marketing Spend 2017-18, link), please provide the following: the marketing brief prepared for the campaign, any information on the campaign objectives and targets, any information on the success of the campaign against those objectives and targets, any information on the number of teachers estimated to have been recruited as a result of the campaign.

The marketing brief for the 2017-18 Teacher Recruitment campaign has already been published in relation to a previous FoI request (FOI/17/02863) and can be found here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-17-02863/ 

Below are the SMART objectives used to measure the success of the campaign and the results achieved against those objectives.

STEM target audience

• Achieve 30% of 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland who study STEM subjects who are aware of the ‘Teaching Makes People’ campaign by March 2018
  • Achieved:  63%
• Maintain 51% positive opinion of secondary school teaching as a career, amongst 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland who study STEM subjects and recognise the campaign
  • Achieved: 50%
• Increase the number of 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland studying STEM subjects who report to be considering teaching as a career by 12pp by March 2018 (from 46% to 58%)
  • Achieved: 2pp (from 46% to 48%)
• Achieve a 55% motivation score in post campaign tracking with the STEM undergraduates audience for ‘Teaching Makes People’ by March 2018
  • Achieved: 53%
• Increase the number of 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland studying STEM subjects who report to be considering applying to PGDE courses by 20pp by March 2018 (from 38% to 58%)
  • Achieved: 9pp (from 38% to 47%)

English target audience

• Achieve 25% of 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland who study English who are aware of the ‘Teaching Makes People’ campaign by March 2018
  • Achieved: 58%
• Achieve 51% positive opinion of secondary school teaching as a career amongst 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland who study English and recognise the campaign
  • Achieved: 64%
• Increase in number of 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland studying English who report to be considering teaching as a career by 12pp by March 2018 (56% to 68%)
  • Achieved:  13pp (56% to 69%)
• Achieve a 55% motivation score in post campaign tracking with the Engligh undergraduates audience for ‘Teaching Makes People’ by March 2018
  • Achieved: 74%
• Increase the number of 2 – 4 year undergraduates in Scotland studying English who report to be considering applying to PGDE courses by 20pp by March 2018 (32% to 52%)
  • Achieved: 36pp (32% to 68%)

All

• Increase traffic to www.teachinscotland.org by 300% year-on-year by March 2018
  • Achieved:
    • Page Views: +303.82% (116,885 to 472,000)
    • Unique Users: +280.34% (36,284 to 138,003)

Information on the number of teachers estimated to have been recruited as a direct result of the campaign is difficult to report on with absolute certainty as a campaign will be only one factor that will impact on this.

However, statistics related to student teaches and teacher vacancies were published by the Scottish Government recently and can be found here: https://www.gov.scot/news/more-teaching-vacancies-filled/

The statistics show that:

• Student teacher intake has increased for three years in a row, reaching 3,902 in 2018 compared to 3,376 in 2015-16
• Growth in teacher numbers across all STEM (Science, Technical, Engineering and Mathematics) subjects