Gresham's pupils film three new School DVD's

Published on isbi School News dated Tuesday 11th of January 2011

In an ambitious and novel marketing project, pupils at Gresham's in Holt have scripted and filmed three new DVDs about the School, now available to watch on the School's website, www.greshams.com. Three teams from the Senior and Prep Schools volunteered for the project, creating the 'pupils-eye' view of life at School.

Headmaster Philip John, in his introduction to the Senior School DVD said, 'Our pupils are our best ambassadors, so they were the obvious choice to make these DVDs. We are very pleased with the result which reflect the pupils' view of life at Gresham's and at the same time very clearly convey the School's ethos and philosophy of providing choice and opportunity for all our students.'

Kate Langley, Marketing Manager added, 'We needed a new marketing DVD and we were all agreed we wanted something which would focus on the pupils more, and I was thinking along the lines of case studies or even video diaries.

'After discussion with a production company, Eye TV from Norwich, I was persuaded that we should go further and let the children not only feature in, but also story board, script and film the three DVDs themselves, turning the whole project into a fantastic educational experience for those who took part.'

Three teams were selected from volunteers, and a marketing brief was given. At the Prep School the Year 8 Scholars class took on the filming of both the Prep and Pre-Prep DVDs, studying the current DVD, and talking to pupils from Nursery to Year 3 to get their input on what makes their school so good! At the Senior School the team took the brief and came up with six themes which they wished to explore: creativity, inspiration, learning, opportunity, community and within these categories they have used a variety of techniques and styles to create a really unique DVD which reflects all the vibrancy of life at Gresham's.

Mr John commented, 'It's interesting that although part of the brief was to give exposure to the academic side of life here, this has come out quite naturally in the interviews the students conducted in the course of filming. Clearly students here see their studies as central to their life which I find very heartening. Such a positive view of School is reflected through these films, and it comes straight from the students; I don't think we could have a better advertisement for what we do here.'

'A Day in the Life of..', 'Gresham's....from the inside' and 'A Day in the Life of Gresham's Pre-Prep' are all now available to view on our website, www.greshams.com.