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Chapter 2 Distribution
2.1 The Launch of Streetsense
Streetsense was launched in September 2003.
A number of initiatives or events marked the launch.
There were two key events arranged for Road Safety Officers by the Scottish Road Safety Campaign, one of which was held in Glenrothes and the other at Strathclyde Country Park. At these events, Road Safety Officers learnt about the resource and undertook a hands-on training exercise aimed at ensuring all officers were familiar with it. This was extremely well received and Road Safety Officers thought that their own familiarisation and training of the resource was very good. Their initial perceptions of the resource were also extremely positive.
The then Scottish Road Safety Campaign ( SRSC) also sent a flyer out to all primary schools in advance of the resource being distributed describing the resource and announcing that it would soon be available to them.
2.2 Means of Distribution
The means by which Streetsense was distributed varied across the country, but the resource has been delivered to most schools across Scotland with only two local authorities yet to complete their distribution and one local authority who did not know about their level of distribution.
Road Safety Officers were given the choice of having the packs delivered to them directly such that they could take the responsibility of distributing the resource to the schools or having the packs sent directly to the schools.
Some Road Safety Officers opted for the resource to be delivered directly to schools since they lacked the time or resources to undertake this task themselves. This ensured that the resource got out to schools in a timely manner. This often happened via the local authority education departments.
Others were keen that they had some input to the process and in particular to use their choice of distribution method as a means of promoting the resource or of offering training in the resource. One Road Safety Officer commented that he felt they would not have done it justice given the effort that went into developing Streetsense just to drop it off at schools without some effort at explanation.
Familiarisation or training in the resource was therefore inextricably linked to the distribution process in some areas.
Some of the authorities that opted to distribute the resource themselves launched the resource locally with an event. An example might be a series of training events that were organised and teachers invited to attend. Events such as these were often arranged jointly between Road Safety Officers and local authority education departments. A choice of dates was commonly offered.
A few authorities felt that it was essential that the distribution of the resource be linked to training in its delivery and have not distributed the resource until the school had completed this training. For a number, that process has taken some time.
Others piggy-backed onto meetings that were already being held for the clusters of head teachers in their areas and tried to obtain a short slot in those to promote Streetsense. The remainder of schools would be covered by personal visits.
Delivery by Road Safety Officers to individual schools was the most common means of distributing the resource. It was emphasised that although Road Safety Officers did try to speak directly to head teachers when they were delivering the resource this did not always happen, in which case the resource may have been left with only a letter of explanation. However many felt that they had been successful in getting access to a senior teacher to introduce it.
The table below gives some indication of the different means that were employed across the 32 authorities.
Table 2.1; Means of distribution of Streetsense
| Number of local authorities |
|---|
Distributed directly to schools | 8 |
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Delivered by RSO or disseminated at a Head Teacher Meeting and then personally to remainder | 16 |
|---|
At launch event or training event | 7 |
|---|
Don't Know | 1 |
|---|
The greatest number of authorities opted to deliver the resource themselves but 8 preferred the resource to be delivered direct to schools.
Most authorities are confident that the resource did in fact get out to all schools. Yet of the 240 schools that responded to the Streetsense survey, 205 (85%) had heard of it and 190 had a copy (79%).
Those who did not have a copy but had heard of Streetsense were asked if they would like a copy. Of the 15 schools, 12 (80%) would like a copy to be made available to them. The two schools that did not want a copy were very small with a roll of less than 50 and in a remote rural location. The sample size is clearly too small to draw any conclusions from this.
Some of those areas that had the resource delivered directly have since followed this up with training.
In addition to distribution to schools copies of the resource were also provided to all of the seven Scottish universities providing teacher training.
2.3 Timing of delivery of Streetsense
Whilst the majority of authorities issued the resource as soon as it arrived, others have delayed the distribution until meetings or training can be arranged with the school and in some cases this has delayed distribution. There are some schools in pockets of the country that still do not have access to this resource or have only recently received it.
Key findings |
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- Road Safety Officers are confident that the majority, if not all of their schools do have a copy of the Streetsense pack. Only two authorities had not yet completed dissemination.
- 79% of schools in the survey indicated that they had a copy.
- In about a quarter of local authorities, the packs were delivered directly to schools. Some of these have subsequently been offered training by Road Safety Officers.
- Just under a quarter of local authorities held a training event at which packs were distributed.
- The remainder were delivered directly to schools by Road Safety Officers although some used cluster meeting of head teachers to disseminate the resource. Typically there was some discussion with the school when delivering the resource.
- Road Safety Officers consider that the distribution process should have achieved good coverage across Scotland although it has been slow in some areas. However the fact that only four in five schools has a copy suggests some weaknesses in either distribution or in awareness.
- Many have made efforts not only to distribute the resource but also to bring it to the attention of schools.
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