Broadcast every week on Wednesdays at 9pm, The Surgery is a popular show on BBC’s Radio 1. Hosted by GP, Dr Radha, and Katie Thistleton, they discuss youth topics and offer helpful advice on key issues that affect young people every day.
The Radio 1 show encourages young people to chat, share experiences and get support on problems impacting students and young people such as; stress, body image, laziness, revision, gender and heartbreak.
CONNECTING WITH YOUNG PEOPLE THROUGH TSR
BBC Radio 1 has a massive youth audience, reaching nearly 10 million across the UK. However when they looked for a platform to reach and engage with young people for the surgery they came to us.
While there is the opportunity to call, text or tweet the radio show, the Surgery approached TSR in 2015 to help them generate conversation, questions and responses. The anonymous nature of TSR’s online forums provides a safe place for young people to be honest and engage in sensitive subjects including mental health, relationships and life around learning.
This encourages authenticity and means the responses given are truly organic, providing The Surgery with an accurate and reliable window into how young people are really thinking, feeling and behaving. The Surgery’s forum has been extremely popular reaching highs of 20,000 page views per thread and an average of 50 responses per thread, some of which are selected and shared on the radio show.
FLYING THE FLAG FOR STUDENTS
Providing expert advice every day to help students through both education and their life around learning, TSR addresses key issues and offers support on topics such as exam stress, revision, career aspirations, relationships and current affairs.
Through this process we gain understanding of how students and young people think and feel. We are passionate about giving these young people a platform and amplifying their voices so that government, business and education leaders are informed and held to account.
Through our annual Options report of 12,000+ students we will be representing the student views and sentiment to government and senior decision makers (drop me a line so I can send you one) and through the build up to the election we have given our users direct, live, online access to figures including Caroline Lucas and Tim Farron.
We constantly grow, develop and inspire conversations with young people around their pathways, choices, options and pressures. We had 7.5 million young people onsite last month discussing their life and future. If you’re interested in speaking to, and understanding students and young people, discover more about how we can help.