Whilst we might not think of developed countries as having big problems with accessible, inclusive, quality education, the UK education system is increasingly becoming warped by accountability. Back in 2011 The Telegraph newspaper wrote an article titled, ‘There is a quiet crisis in Britain’s education system’; this crisis has become progressively worse, particularly for STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, maths).

Accountability has led to much teaching becoming about ‘force-feeding’ information to pass tests. The removal of science SATs (assessment tests for pupils) in 2009 was supposed to stop this and encourage better teaching. It backfired: schools began teaching less science.

With no reward or sanction for good or weak science achievement, pressurised schools could focus entirely on English and maths, which are both assessed by SATs and Ofsted (Ofsted is the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills. It reports directly to Parliament and inspects schools with the aim of promoting improvement and holding schools to account). There was an increasing risk of failing to inspire children to continue education and careers in science, technology, engineering and other related subjects.

We discovered the reason science education is declining in quality and quantity is because primary school teachers are actually anxious about teaching science. So, our idea was to not mention the thing they were scared of: science. Instead, we decided to create an innovative teaching tool. We called it Explorify - a programme of hundreds of classroom activities to spark kids’ curiosity about the world around them. It was science in disguise. It made science fun, accessible and inclusive to all pupils.

Teachers are bombarded with boring teaching resources all the time. So, we made sure Explorify was totally different. We branded it as a consumer product. We focused on sticky naming to excite the children. The visual branding was attractive and exciting, miles away from the education world’s clip art and Comic Sans. Forget classroom PDFs; Explorify has online access, interactive UX, engaging films and gamified learning with rewards.

Our partner education specialists AB tested Explorify for 8 months, to ensure it was high quality and inspiring.

At launch, our marketing strategy was unconventional. With a media budget of only £3,000, we subverted the norms of the education world. Our promotional films were inspired by the successes of TV shows such as ‘Gogglesprogs’, focusing on pupils’ charming and inspired reactions to Explorify. We ignored cluttered teacher media channels (staffroom pigeon hole, education magazines), and controversially chose Facebook.

At beta launch in January 2017 Explorify consisted of 30 activities. Within one year, 200 activities have been developed and Explorify is ever growing in scale and popularity. It is now supported with content donated by the BBC, The Science Museum, The Eden Project, who all see the potential success of Explorify.

The tool is free, fulfilling Wellcome’s desire to make science education accessible and inclusive to all.

We tripled the sign-up target at launch. And with 20,000 sign ups (13,000 verified primary school teachers) in just one year, we are reaching at least 325,000 pupils with inclusive, quality science education. Activities are consistently 98% positively rated and we have hundreds of qualitative responses from teachers about how Explorify is transforming science education in their schools, for instance, “Because of Explorify, my pupils have been given a chance in science”, or, “The children ask me every day if they can do more Explorify!”

Explorify is ever-growing, with ever-changing content, now supported by the BBC and other organisations. It is even being translated into different languages. With hundreds of thousands of children accessing the product within just one year, Explorify promises to transform science education for an entire generation. Explorify is the accessible science education tool for a new generation.

Sign up and try it for yourself at https://explorify.wellcome.ac.uk/

The obvious strategic approach would have been a staffroom campaign that loudly championed science. But qualitative and quantitative research showed us that primary school teachers are actually anxious about science, with only 1 in 10 having a degree in it.

Our strategic breakthrough was realising how toxic the word ‘science’ was. In research, even the mention of science put teachers off. We needed a good disguise, something to make our cause feel more relevant and desirable to teachers. This is what led us to create a classroom solution: Explorify.

Two other important parts of the strategy:

1. To employ the rules of consumer marketing in a B2B teaching world, through branding, consumer channels (Facebook) and emotive, not rational, communications.

2. To apply behavioural science to encourage engagement. One example was our scarcity strategy to make the product feel desirable with a limited invite-only beta phase (à la Gmail, Spotify, etc).

Our client, Wellcome (previously The Wellcome Trust) is the second biggest charity in the world. They fund many of the world’s most important science discoveries (sequencing the human genome, the Ebola vaccine). They have a dedicated education department, who on their website say, “We’re committed to making inspiring, high-quality science education available to all young people”. Sustainable, quality science education is what they strive for every day. In 2016, Wellcome saw the future of the UK’s science education in danger. Primary school children were learning less science than ever, in quality and quantity. By 2016, 51% of primary teachers were spending less than an hour on science each week, with half not even teaching it weekly. Whilst British scientists have historically helped change the world, an entire generation’s opportunity for a future in science was now jeopardised.

Wellcome’s brief to us was urgent and significant: protect the future of UK science by making quality science education accessible to all children. Our target was teachers. The long-term objective is to inspire an entire generation to continue engaging with science, in education and in their careers. The short-term objective was to improve the quality and quantity of science teaching in primary schools.