Engage for Education will soon be a year old. We have been asked recently for details about the amount of activity on the site since it launched last May and also about the cost of creating and maintaining the site.

 

 

In keeping with the spirit of Engage – openness and transparency – we are happy to provide those details to all those who use Engage. 

Since Engage launched, tens of thousands of people have visited it, many have commented on it, subscribed to it, participated in its workshops, blogged on it, tweeted about it and even become a fan of it on Facebook. 

It is fulfilling its initial purpose by:

  1. giving a voice to the education community
  2. creating a dialogue about the future of education
  3. enabling the sharing of views and creating an opportunity to influence decision-making
  4. making the Scottish Government more transparent, open and accountable.

Here’s just a few fact and figures about Engage.  In the first 9 months we have had*:

  1.  42,056 visits
  2. 115,436 page views
  3. 560 registered users
  4. 1938 subscribers to the weekly newsletter 
  5. 540 followers on Twitter (@engagefored)
  6. 1698 YouTube views
  7. 100 Facebook fans (since Facebook launch on 25 January)

Of course there is a cost associated with any project of this sort. The creation and direct maintenance of Engage has cost just under £67,000.  We built this using free Open Source software and where possible have made use of free tools such as YouTube and Twitter. 

Users of Engage have helped shape the Donaldson’s review of teacher education and contributed to the green paper on higher education, to name just two major pieces of work. 

We are proud of what Engage has achieved and are excited about what it can achieve in the future. And we remain committed to being transparent in everything we do.  Indeed, we would welcome your feedback about how we could improve this work even further. 

Further information

For full details of information provided under Freedom of Information on Engage user figures and costs click here.

* Figures relate to the first nine months of activity on Engage from May 2010 to February 2011.