Almost 9 in 10 teachers agree that education should prepare young people for the digital workplace while 3 in 4 teachers believe technology should be made available across the curriculum to support literacy, according to a new report from the National Literacy Trust. A huge part of the reason why this isn’t happening is both a lack of investment in the technology itself but also in developing teachers’ skills.

This is something that BT wants to change with the launch of their biggest brand campaign for 20 years, ‘Beyond Limits,’ to champion the digital curriculum in Britain and demonstrate their commitment to help create a better connected country.

With words by Charles Dickens and a soundtrack by Stormzy, each both reflective of and reflecting the era they emerged in, the girl narrating the ad walks through the streets of Britain. She recites the opening paragraph of Dickens' The Tale of Two Cities, full of the juxtaposition of both the author’s era and the narrator’s own, “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.”

The campaign, led by Saatchi & Saatchi London, showcases the development of technology in Britain over the last few decades, from electric street lights to tube advancements and the growth of CCTV. The words overlaid with the technological images are designed to encourage viewers to see both the positive and negative sides of tech.

“It was the epoch of belief” the girl says as she weaves her way through a crowd of smart phone users, their faces illuminated blue and their eyes cast down. The ad concludes with the girl entering her tech-enabled classroom, a move designed to highlight BT’s Barefoot programme which trains teachers across the UK in coding and other computing skills.

The campaign was launched with an event hosted by Tess Daley at Wembley Arena where Jess Glynne gave a performance that included 160 choreographed drones created by students from St Joseph’s School in Islington. BT have also struck a partnership with ITV to create a network takeover this weekend, with idents for the channel devised by children at two primary schools who combined their coding skills to operate a futuristic robotic arm.

The conclusion drawn by the ad is that technology can, and does, play a positive role in our day to day lives, and that this is something we should be both optimistic about and proud of. It delivers a message of hope at a time of heightened uncertainty in Britain, revealing the role that a brand can have in helping to educate and enable the next generation as well as those who teach them.