Youth education resources research is one of several types of research that the British Red Cross has commissioned within the Education and Skills sector. DJS Research specialises in Education research, while also having many clients from the charity and not for profit sector. As a result of this wealth of experience and the numerous clients within these sectors, as well as the expertise gained through carrying out similar projects in the past, DJS Research is an ideal candidate to take on further projects of this kind.
Previous youth education resources research was required when the British Red Cross developed a new offer, for all young people aged 6-19 years. This offer includes Humanitarian Education and First Aid training, using both free and paid-for resources.
The specific emphasis of this youth education resources research was to engage with formal educators in schools to help identify their requirements, approaches and formats for the teaching resources that the British Red Cross provides through the education division. It was also necessary to establish what would influence schools to use the British Red Cross resources over other providers of training resources. The main research objectives of the project fell into 5 key areas: teacher behaviour and attitudes, technology, resource preferences, continuing professional development, brand perceptions and marketing.
In detail, when carrying out this youth education resources research, DJS designed a research approach that would identify and prioritise key decision makers in schools for selecting and using teaching resources, and which communication channels have the greatest impact on them, prioritise the key criteria for selecting teaching resources, discover how teachers search for and access these resources, examine the formats that teachers use, understand the perceptions towards British Red Cross in relation to teaching resources and to discover the key messaging to be used in order to differentiate them from competitors. The project also incorporated various other aims such as understanding the use of technology in classrooms and gain feedback on the current range of teaching resources.
DJS Research successfully completed this past youth education resources research, making the company ideally placed to conduct similar projects in future, as well as other types of research within the education and not-for-profit sectors, due to the vast array of experience held by the team in these areas.