Deafening Silence on BBC Jam

Posted on | March 2, 2008 | 10 Comments

I was given the privilege, back in the early ’90s, of working with a group of people in Lothian Regional Council (a big single-tier council which, at that time, before the disaggregation of Scottish local authorities in 1995/96, covered Edinburgh and the Lothians) whose task it was to provide ICT training to teachers, usually in evening courses, across the authority. Many in that group went on in subsequent years to serve education and ICT at national levels, both in the public and private sectors.

One such is Neil Livesey, who has worked for Apple, Granada Learning and the BBC over the years, and who, like most of those people I worked with back in Lothan Region all those years ago, has proved his absolute commitment time and time again to the learner in UK schools.

Neil was a key player in the development and dissemination of BBC Jam, and I know that he developed a strong loyalty to its core concepts and principles, as did so many who worked on that groundbreaking project. I am therefore more than aware of the difficult personal issues that Neil must have had to reconcile before submitting the following comment to my blog yesterday. I think his comment deserves a wider airing, so I am repeating it here:

“As someone who worked on BBC jam I”m very despondent about the BBC ever being in a position to support “formal” education in the future. The BBC now have no schools radio or TV – their core offering from the inception of the BBC back in the 1930′. Any attempt to produce further web based content will undoubtedly lead the commercial sector running to Europe complaining of unfair competition.

The BBC and BBC Trust should reconsider their decisions regarding BBC jam. The BBC need to go back to basics by supporting formal education and fighting Europe on the BBC values indicated in their charter :-

“promoting education and learning, both formal and informal, through accessible content covering a wide range of subjects and issues”

and

“The BBC believes it can substantially strengthen the delivery of its role in education and learning, with some radical changes in approach which go beyond old notions of “educational programmes”. It aims to exploit fully new technologies, reach a broader swathe of learners – including those with the greatest needs draw on the industry’ best creative skills, and tap into the wealth of the BBC archive to support lifelong learning.
With these aims, the Governors will approve and publish a coherent long-term strategy for the BBC’ contribution to learning. In this respect, the management considers its definition of three categories of learning provision – formal, informal but targeted, and informal arising from general programming – as useful, and the Governors will consider them as a framework for the BBC’ activities.”

Need I say more. The BBC needs to come back with better proposals to support education not just a comment from the BBC Trust that the BBC jam service will cease.

By the way the only good point in the announcement is that there is content sitting on BBC servers that could be released to various government agencies for use in minority curricular areas. This content would support “indigenous” languages and a variety of learning support students. It will need a groundswell of public and government pressure to ensure that any content is released for other use.”

To date, I have been deafened by the complete silence from across the various parts of the UK education establishment who ought to be shouting from the rooftops about, at the very least, the gross waste of pubic monies that will result from the demise of BBC Jam unless all (ALL!) of the materials produced to date are recovered and made available to teachers and learners across the home countries as a matter of urgency – and as a matter of principle!

To all my friends and colleagues in SEED, DCFS, LT Scotland, Becta, C2K, SQA, QCA, NAACE, SICTDG….and so many other government, public sector and representative bodies and agencies who are supposed to protect the interests of UK education, I say: when will we hear from you?

Time, perhaps, to stop talking behind the scenes and go public on this scandal (for that is what it is, despite the silence).

Technorati Tags: bbc jam, scandal, public money, silence, principle

Category: education, learning, politics

Comments

10 Responses to “Deafening Silence on BBC Jam”

jim henderson
March 2nd, 2008 @ 9:06 pm

John, I agree the debacle over JAM is a retrospect move from the BBC’s commitment in its charter to provide educational content. It is also crazy that the BBC has a load of educational content originally commissioned for JAM sitting on servers that pupils and teachers cannot access. This could easily be distributed to schools within GLOW. Perhaps we should take this into the political realm and start a petition on the No. 10 web site demanding the release of archived JAM educational resources into the public domain? After all it has be procured via the license fee and we know the recent problems the BBC has been with regard to re-negotiating this with the current government.
(Disclosure: A few months before the demise of JAM the BBC had approached me to produce materials for JAM for the Modern Studies curriculum in Scotland).
John Connell
March 2nd, 2008 @ 9:17 pm

Good idea, Jim. Depending on how reserved powers are interpreted, there is also the option of an e-petition to the Scottish Parliament as well.
Anna Rossvoll
March 3rd, 2008 @ 3:26 pm

I was given the opportunity to trial the augmented reality story telling. It was absolutely brilliant; truly innovative. You held a paper panel under a web cam and a 3 D character appeared before your eyes, on the screen of course! The children were awe struck. They loved guiding the chicken around the sleeping wolf and physically jumped when the wolf moved. It was a magical experience which wholeheartedly enriched and developed literacy. Where can I sign the petition?
John Connell
March 3rd, 2008 @ 5:12 pm

Good to hear from you, Anna.

The e-Petition is a mechanism by which citizens can register issues with the Scottish Parliament – if enough people show interest, or if the issue is one that is picked up by an MSP, it can be raised in the chamber and debated further. No one has actually instigated one yet – might be worth thinking about though.

How’s the old man?
Laura Compton
March 3rd, 2008 @ 10:04 pm

Like so many others I still feel angry and frustrated by the travesty the is loss of Jam. As long as the materials exist the education community has to fight for them. If a mechanism exists then we can all play our part in raising awareness. Maybe an ePetition is the way to go. Nothing to lose.
John Connell
March 3rd, 2008 @ 10:22 pm

I should mention, when I say that no one has instigated one yet, I mean no one has done so on this topic – there have been lots of successful ePetitions on other issues.
Anna Rossvoll
March 5th, 2008 @ 12:07 am

The ‘Old Man’ is still alive and jiving!!! Driving me nuts but keeping me on my toes about Glow! I’m sure that Jam will be on the agenda for SICTDG on Fri, rather than the buttries!!.
John Connell
March 5th, 2008 @ 12:27 am

Give him my best wishes, Anna.

And how is Kim these days too?
Neil
March 12th, 2008 @ 10:46 am

Hi John, thank you for the kind words.

Perhaps its the dour Scot in me but I cannot stop complaining about what happened with BBC jam. Yes, I lost my consultancy. Yes, I was passionate about the project. Yes, I’m still upset about it…..but not for me personally. BBC jam had a lot to offer to those less fortunate than myself or my children. BBC jam would have engaged with learners who are disenfranchised from the present education system, provide additional learning support for all learners. With specific help for; the deaf, the blind, the home schooled and those who find difficulty fitting into this modern society. This is everything that the BBC charter sets out to do – so why scrap BBC jam? The BBC should have fought this decision not rolled over and caved in to pressure from Europe.

Over 63,000 pupils “bunk off” from school EVERY day in the UK and its increasing year on year. What does this tell you about our education system?

BBC jam wasn’t perfect but it was improving. The unreleased software was outstanding. Aimed at the disenfranchised, the minorities with a variety of language support and aimed at the individual learner. This wasn’t content for teachers but content for the learner, for them personally. It is a pity the senior management in the BBC and others in the commercial sector couldn’t recognise this.
Andy Preston
March 15th, 2008 @ 1:35 am

Hi John,
What might help to create energy to lobby , look at ways forward and make thing something happen at all levels would be to understand what is in the vault. For 75 million it should be pretty extensive. If people really knew what it was then it may inspire them to fight for it.
kind regards
Andy Preston

ps like your blog , what service are you using?