Digital Day 2022

Yesterday we took part in the annual Digital Day organised by BIMA and had as much fun as usual with our school partners the North East Futures UTC. Digital Day’s aim is to bring digital to life for young people across the UK, inspiring them to develop the skills needed to enter a career in the digital industry. It's one day that makes a world of difference.

Every year the British Interactive Media Association (BIMA) run Digital Day, the only initiative of its kind, giving 11-16 year olds an insight into a world of digital careers by partnering agencies with schools. 2022 is the fourth time we’ve partnered with North East Futures UTC to deliver the day to their entire school of over 350 students. As a UTC (University Technical College) they balance a strong core curriculum and technical qualifications to give students a more rounded experience of school, they call it ‘School but different’. As well as taking part in Digital Day we are one of the UTC’s industry partner’s, providing real world case studies as well as mentorship, work placements and support to their students. We designed and built their website too!

A key part of each Digital Day are the challenges, they are sponsored by well-known brands and focus on real-life issues giving students the experience of taking on a real brief from a client and answering it creatively using digital. Every year we are blown away by the imagination, ingenuity and enthusiasm that the students have for the challenges. They always surprise us with ideas that we haven’t thought of and the sheer amount of work that they get through, creating presentations, wireframes and even fully functioning apps and websites in just a few hours.

This years challenges were set by Primark and Royal Mail. Primark’s challenge was centred around digital solutions to help them make more sustainable fashion affordable for everyone. We saw students coming up with some incredible ideas including new mobile apps with rewards for sustainable customer behaviour, in store experiences encouraging recycling and reuse and more.

The Royal Mail focused their challenge on asking students to create the “Digital Doorstep” of the future, encouraging them to imagine the best possible experience for sending and receiving parcels for everyone, whether they are young, old, unable to afford travel or living with a disability. Again we had a huge variety of innovative and well thought out ideas from drones and robots to schemes where Royal Mail is the platform connecting users and drivers a bit like Uber or Deliveroo but delivered by local communities working together.

At the end of the day and after a lot of well designed and delivered pitches chose a winner for each challenge which will be submitted to BIMA as part of the nationwide challenge competition for a chance to win £500 cash for the school and some fantastic prizes for themselves.

As always our team of volunteers had an incredible day and we are already looking forward to next year’s Digital Day.