Report on Advertising in Schools Consultation

In April 2004 we sent the consultation on advertising in schools to all our member schools. We asked them to discuss the issue of advertising in schools either within the PTA committee or more widely.

Process
In April 2004 we sent the attached consultation to all our member schools. We asked them to discuss the issue of advertising in schools either within the PTA committee or more widely. It was encouraging that many schools clearly did send the consultation out to all parents although, in most cases, the number who responded was not large. As one school told us “this is not a burning issue for parents”. However, several people supplemented their response with comments and it is clear from these that where people have thought about the issue, they have strong views.

Response
In total, we heard back from 1,151 individuals in 92 schools, both primary and secondary, across 26 local authorities. Respondents were asked to vote for one of four options, and everyone did this – there was no evidence of double voting.

Of the four options, one was for the status quo and this attracted 44.2% of the votes. The other three options all called for some tightening of procedures and in all 55.9% voted for change. Of this group nearly three quarters voted for stricter and nationally agreed guidelines to be imposed on the current system of sponsorship and advertising. Only 15.1% opted for an all out ban and 14.3% supported the idea that all sponsorship should be done through a central fund.

Comments
From the comments it is clear that there is considerable opposition to multi-nationals advertising in schools, with particularly strong opposition to McDonalds and Coca Cola. In contrast, parents were happy about local businesses and suppliers advertising in some way. Indeed, one school commented that there was enormous value to the whole community if the school and local businesses built strong links through sponsorship. (However, this probably would not extend to what is happening in one school in England. St Mary’s Church of England primary school in north London receives £500 a month from a local estate agent in return for putting the estate agents logo on its regular newsletter!) Some parents suggested that a “selective ban” might be an attractive option whilst others suggested that advertising could be used to positive effect – to promote healthy food, for example.

Some parents expressed concern at “nationally imposed” guidelines, feeling that this was a matter best left to local decision-making by the headteacher. As always there was concern about who would actually draw up the guidelines and what consultation there would be.

There was criticism of companies that used “pester power” to get parents to buy certain products/shop in certain shops in order to “earn” some benefit – Tesco and Funny Bones were mentioned here.

Conclusion
This survey had two purposes. The first was to find out what parents think and the second was to get people talking about the issue of advertising in schools. It is clear that whilst advertising in schools does not rouse many people to passion, there is considerable unhappiness about multinationals, particularly the food giants when their products are seen as contrary to current efforts to promote healthy eating. As for getting people talking – we are encouraged that so many people did respond and particularly grateful to those schools that added the survey to a newsletter and sent it out to everyone.

July 2004