SecEd's coverage of London riots proves a social media hit

SecEd Online scored a notable success during the normally quiet month of August thanks to reporter Daniel White and his response to the summer riots.


As the riots spread across London and other major UK cities, many politicians, commentators in the national media and others were laying the blame at the door of schools.


With discussions centring on a lack of discipline, White set about crafting an analysis of these claims and sought response from a wide range of educationalists. His piece considered a number of other arguments as to why the riots might have happened and considered a range of government education policies and what role they might have played.


And so while many were publishing shorter sound-bite news stories, White's in depth, feature-length commentary, it was hoped, would provide a more engaging piece of journalism for SecEd’s online readership.


And it proved a big hit, as not only did the story rank among the top five most read articles in SecEd’s online history, it was also picked up by The Guardian and referencing as part of its online education coverage, driving yet more hits to the SecEd website.


SecEd’s social media following also had plenty to say on the piece, with many of its 4,000-plus followers retweeting the article link.


SecEd editor Pete Henshaw said: “It can be very difficult to attract a high volume of web traffic in August, when our readers are not in school, but Daniel’s article gave us a spike in our web activity and hopefully helped to cement our reputation for in-depth and analytical journalism, rather than quick and easy headlines.”


Read the coverage here and follow @SecEd_Education

 

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