Is the ultimate goal of a teacher just to help students get high scores and pass exams?
In a joint project with the Singapore Ministry of Education (MOE), DDB Group Singapore has shown a different perspective on the value of teachers in each person’s life. Not stopping at grades or exams, teachers are the ones who influence who we are now and what we will become in the future. This is also the big idea of MOE’s entire integrated communication campaign – “It all begins with a teacher”.
While education authorities are shifting their focus to knowledge, values and life skills, the awareness of the majority of the public has not kept up with this. The problem is how to both recruit more teachers and change perceptions about the role of education. DDB solved the problem by “touching” the deep values of teachers.
Opening the campaign is a short film broadcast simultaneously on TV and online with the curious title “Why”. In 3 minutes, the story of the student and his teacher revolving around the questions “Why…” quickly spread on Singaporean social networks.
Until now, we have turned to teachers to find specific answers about a certain problem. What if what we get is a question? Instead of giving specific answers, teachers are the ones who ask questions to help arouse curiosity in each of us. Questions like: “What is your dream?”, “If someone can do it, why not you?”, “What if we look at failure as an opportunity?”… stimulates us to explore and get to the bottom of the problem, from there, we can see our own abilities. This is the true value of teaching, and is also the inspiration for the DDB Singapore creative team to launch the touching “It all begins with a teacher” campaign. This campaign is also DDB’s first “work” for the Singapore Ministry of Education – the most special client ever.
After only 2 days of airing, the clip received 257,000 views on YouTube and Facebook, nearly 3,000 comments and 2,000 shares.
The message is deployed on many channels, from outdoor billboards…
…to print:
We may forget the content in our classes, but we will never forget that there is a teacher who is always with us. To once again reiterate the value of teachers before Teacher’s Day, a series of surprise clips for teachers were posted:
Immediately after that, the second TVC was officially launched and received a warm reception from both students and teachers when challenging society’s prejudices about success and scores:
Teaching knowledge, helping us overcome difficulties, inspiring in life… there are many adjectives to describe the portrait of a teacher. But, if summed up, teachers are simply people who change the way we think and choose. Life is the result of a series of decisions, making the right decisions from the beginning is a solid foundation to build the future.
