WTCI FILLS CRITICAL ROLE IN PANDEMIC
When WTCI-PBS began 50 years ago, we were known primarily as “educational television.” Today, that tradition continues as we support our community by providing at-home learning services to assist students, families, teachers, administrators and school systems across the Tennessee Valley viewing area during the coronavirus outbreak.
This response builds on public television’s success in education. Our early childhood television programs have been proven to help close the achievement gap between children in lower-income families and their more affluent peers. Local PBS stations like ours have served more than a million elementary and secondary school teachers for years across the country through PBS LearningMedia. This collection of interactive digital learning objects is curated from the best of decades of public television’s national and local programming.
But in the wake of the new pandemic, WTCI-PBS, and all other public television stations, is pursuing our education mission with renewed vigor, clearing our daytime schedule to broadcast pre-K through 12th grade instructional programming, creating and curating educational activities, and working with the Tennessee Department of Education and local school districts to ensure that established K-12 curriculum is covered in these unprecedented circumstances.
In addition to these initiatives, WTCI has been working to provide even more resources for students and parents in the Chattanooga area.
WTCI-PBS collaborated with Hamilton County Schools to produce three live hour-long, call-in programs. These shows offered updated information for families and students about community resources and supports in place for learning at home when they were needed most.
Working closely with local educators, we have created a broadcast schedule and educational resources that align with teaching standards as well as curriculum in math, science, reading, and social studies for grades pre-K through 12th grade. You can find our free over-the-air educational broadcast on channel 45.3 weekdays from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. This service is also available on Comcast 202 and EPB Channel 4.
Additionally, we have partnered with the Tennessee Department of Education to broadcast six hours of classroom instruction with Tennessee teachers for grades 1-8. The full schedule of this programming is online at tn.gov/education/pbsteaching.
Wtcitv.org/education offers educational tools and emotional and mental wellness resources, developed by experts and available in both English and Spanish for teachers, students, and families, to help us all get through this unprecedented experience together. These tools include digital learning activities, educational games, interactive lessons from PBS Learning Media, and printable resources to provide activities to students who do not have access to digital technology. These resources are all free for anyone to use and correspond with standards-aligned PBS video content available on-air or online at pbskids.org.
WTCI is providing educational television when America needs it most, and it’s an important return on the investments individual and corporate donors, federal, state and local governments have been making in our work for decades.
All of this work is what America public television stations do every day, in addition to broadcasting the national programs people love.
The Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 requires us to serve everybody, everywhere, every day for free. And WTCI-PBS is doing just that.
Steve Gatlin is chairman of the board of WTCI. Contact him at stevedgatlin@gmail.com.