Technology which engages hard to reach audiences

BBC Sport Broadcast Assistant, Shajan Miah brought his digital expertise to the BBC UK-wide initiative - ‘Make It Digital’, while working with Outreach on a six week attachment. The ‘Make It Digital’ 2015 campaign has been inspiring a new generation to get creative with coding, programming and digital technology.

“I am passionate about inspiring young people to follow their dreams’’.

Volunteering is important to me and in my free time I am a Trustee with an anger management charity, I work with ex-offenders and also with young people in schools. When the opportunity came up to join Outreach on attachment, I was really pleased.

While on attachment, TeenTech was the project I enjoyed the most - it really captured my imagination. TeenTech CIC runs live events with a supporting Award scheme which helps young teenagers understand the wide range of career possibilities in Science, Engineering and Technology. My Outreach role included running an interactive stand and acting as an industry ambassador at the TeenTech Humber event and co-ordinating the BBC sessions at the TeenTech Awards in London. At the KC Stadium in Hull, young graduates and apprentices from over 40 companies gave school students across the regions a taste of working in science, engineering and technology.

I accompanied groups of students and their teachers around the various interactive stands, while providing a sound board and support as they tried out various challenges and experiments. It was then great to see students from across the UK showcase their own full scale projects (which had been inspired by these event days) in front of patron HRH Duke of York at the TeenTech Award ceremony at the Royal Society.

Teen Tech founder, Maggie Philbin said: “The support of the BBC was very much appreciated and I overheard one group of girls downstairs discussing the BBC apprenticeship scheme, saying that it was the first they'd heard of it, that it sounded fantastic and they were going to apply.”

From my time in BBC Outreach I have been able to take some extremely valuable lessons on hard to reach audiences back to my department, BBC Sport. Spending time with the young people has helped me identify Facebook, and the BBC Sport’s App as two of the most popular tools young people use while engaging with BBC Sport services. Our Facebook presence was highlighted as a key platform for young people, and we are now looking into how we can make our BBC Sport’s App more youth friendly.

My BBC Sport’s team and department are really supportive in engaging young people, and since I have returned from Outreach, I’ve been given the opportunity to set up my own tour for hard to reach young people at BBC Sport. I’m happy to say that due to the assistance of my colleagues, 40 young people from black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds have explored career opportunities in BBC Sport.

There is clearly a role that businesses can play in supporting community and youth development through technology. I am from North London and have seen how this type of initiative can benefit diverse communities and young people in the area. I have also taken some of the lessons I have learnt back to my community, and in my spare time I am using it in my work with local youths. I’ve always had an interest in technology, and working with Outreach has really inspired me to look at how technology can be used to support and engage with hard to reach audiences.

BBC Outreach & Corporate Responsibility brings the BBC closer to its audiences - particularly those audiences we have identified as harder to reach - with face-to-face activity, community support and staff volunteering.