Latest twist in digital learning saga

Resignation likely to delay BBC's plans for schools

By Torin Douglas BBC media correspondent

The resignation of Michael Stevenson is the latest - and most unexpected - development in a saga that goes to the heart of the debate over the BBC's role as a public service broadcaster - and its increasingly antagonistic relationship with its commercial rivals.

The commercial publishers may not have halted the Digital Curriculum, but their legal action seems certainly to have delayed it

Stevenson - as head of the BBC's education department - was the architect of the BBC's moves to bring its schools broadcasting into the digital age, through computers and interactive digital television.

Digital TV proved a blind alley - at least as far as education was concerned - and it soon became clear that computers and online learning were the government's preferred way forward for schools.

So Stevenson and his BBC team developed the "Digital Curriculum", as part of the government's own Curriculum Online initiative, to create teaching materials for computers that could be used in schools, homes and libraries.

Approval needed

With backing from the BBC director-general, Greg Dyke, Stevenson and his team developed plans to spend £150m of licence fee money on the scheme over five years, initially on core GCSE subjects.

But because it was a new service, it required government approval before it could be launched.

The BBC insisted the Digital Curriculum was a natural extension of the schools programmes it had provided on radio and television for more than 70 years.

But the scheme was strongly opposed by educational publishers and software companies, who claimed it would compete head-on with their businesses and - because it would be free to schools - would cost them up to £400m pounds in lost sales.

They argued it was an improper use of licence-payers' money.

Discussions

The largest independent supplier - RM - led a legal challenge, backed by 17 other software companies.

After the case came to court last October, it emerged that Stevenson had broken a commitment by the BBC not to incur any expenditure or develop the service until the government had granted its approval.

He had held discussions with a potential distribution partner - the giant educational publisher Pearson - before the project was approved.

He has now resigned after an internal inquiry criticised his actions.

Future delay

RM's director of corporate relations, Phil Hemming, said he felt some degree of satisfaction that Stevenson had "done the decent thing", but also frustration that it had taken so long - and the full armoury of the law - to bring the matter out into the open.

He said the case underlined the commercial companies' concern about the governance of the BBC.

Others - including Mr Dyke - feel that Stevenson has acted with honour in resigning over the issue.

Stevenson's departure and that of the director of the Digital Curriculum project, Clare Riley - who has also resigned over the issue - leaves the immediate future of the service in doubt.

Neither will leave immediately, to ensure an orderly handover, but he was the person who had led the project from the start, handling many of the detailed negotiations with government departments, schools and potential suppliers.

The service is unlikely to be ready for schools by the autumn of next year, which means September 2005 seems the earliest launch date.

The commercial publishers may not have halted the Digital Curriculum, but their legal action seems certainly to have delayed it.

And RM says it is still considering possible complaints to the Office of Fair Trading and the European Commission.