Two academics in the Research School of Social Sciences set a new University record for media coverage with a report on literacy and numeracy levels, and in doing so kicked of a national debate.

Chris Ryan and Andrew Leigh’s report ‘How has school productivity changed in Australia?’ examined the literacy and numeracy skills of young Australian teenagers between 1964 and 2003.

They found that over the past three to four decades skills in neither area have improved and may have even slightly declined, despite substantial increases in per-child education spending.

A media release issued on Sunday 10 February and the subsequent public debate resulted in almost 2000 mentions in the media by the following Friday.

The story was picked up by television shows from Sunrise to Sky News, radio stations from Launceston to Townsville and everywhere in between as well as every major metropolitan newspaper and a significant number of regional and suburban papers.

Despite more than a dozen interviews in the first day of the story cycle, Andrew was not perturbed by the pressure to perform for the media. “Talking to a range of different journalists is challenging and made me think about different aspects of the research,” he said.

“It’s both interesting and stimulating to speak to a range of audiences and distil the different findings down to one or two sentences.”

Last year Andrew won the ANU Media Prize for the academic who spoke on the widest number of topics for the year. The 2007 prize for the best result from a media release went to Brendan Mackey from the Fenner School with 187 media stories.

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