Temple University Television (TUTV) has played a pivotal role in Temple University’s media output during the COVID-19 pandemic. The station has collaborated with other Temple student media on a multimedia website that tracks COVID-19 developments and how the university and its community are affected. Now, the station is responding to the changes brought on by the pandemic by introducing a children’s initiative that broadcasts daily media designed to help school-aged children learn outside of traditional classrooms and assist their parents or caregivers in at-home education.
The children’s initiative consists of the Temple TV Kid’s Club, a children’s block of educational content, the re-airing of original episodes of the beloved regional children’s show Captain Noah and His Magical Ark and Advice from the Classroom segments for parents created in collaboration with the College of Education and the Center for Media and Information Literacy (CMIL). TUTV has rallied the university’s top media talent and its plethora of resources to make this initiative possible.
Faculty members who manage and contribute to TUTV were excited to brainstorm ways to give back to the station’s audience during the COVID-19 pandemic. George Cummings, programming and production manager of TUTV, was one of the first faculty members to design a viable program for the initiative. Cummings uses content he previously gathered and is currently collecting from the public, educational and governmental access cable channels. The external programming includes Computer Programming 4 Kids, TeenTV and Expedition New England.
Similarly, Paul Gluck, general manager of TUTV, helped bring Captain Noah to the station. Originally broadcast from 1967 to 1994 and airing on Philadelphia’s 6ABC, the show taught its young audience about the importance of consideration, kindness and imagination.
TUTV received permission to air the episodes from Klein alumnus and 6ABC President and General Manager Bernie Prazenica. When Gluck received original copies of the episodes from the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia, he digitally restored five of them in their entirety. 6ABC also lended the talents of morning news anchor Matt O’Donnell to introduce Captain Noah’s TUTV debut.
Gluck believes that the show not only retains the impact it had on children decades ago, but may also serve as a nostalgic program for parents and caregivers who grew up watching it. Broadcasting Captain Noah serves as just one example of what TUTV is striving to accomplish during the pandemic.
“We always talk about what TUTV’s responsibilities are as sort of being the showcase of the best work done by students, faculty, staff, alumni, community and professional partners,” Gluck says. “In this case, we’re happy to be able to make a contribution to the all-important mission of educating young people and to be able to use a platform like television and our online service templetv.net to do that.”
Other TUTV faculty are creating new media. Ed Dress, TUTV’s content producer, is collaborating with the College of Education and the Center for Media and Information Literacy (CMIL) to put together Advice from the Classroom. The short installments are shown in between other programming and are introduced by Sherri Hope Culver, director of CMIL, with the main content presented by various early education College of Education instructors. Advice from the Classroom presents strategies to parents and caregivers that can help them educate their children at home in ways that may even venture beyond traditional classroom teaching practices. Dress says that the instructors offer “really good real-world advice” that is easily accessible to parents and caregivers.
“No one wants to see their children fall behind in their school work because of this pandemic and this situation. So that’s really the goal: I think TUTV can really help out with that goal and I think it’s really great that we can help out and actually have a partnership with the College of Education,” Dress says.
Brian Matheis, a rising senior media studies and production student who has worked with TUTV since his freshman year, has assisted in producing Advice from the Classroom. Although he does not have access to the station’s state-of-the-art broadcasting equipment, he uses Zoom, the video conferencing system that has quickly become a social distancing favorite, to record the instructors, while utilizing post-recording editing and graphics to design polished finished segments. Producing the segment has helped him realize that media is needed now more than ever, and he is appreciative of his opportunity to help create informative programming.
“The biggest thing about the project is that there’s a lot of non-essential businesses being shut down,” Matheis says. “And obviously when things need to be communicated to the public, media can’t shut down.”
Gluck believes that the children’s initiative can help invigorate not only the station and its programming but also the station’s viewers.
“We’re hopeful that this helps us find new opportunities, long after this pandemic is hopefully behind us, long after we’re back on campus and youngsters are back in classrooms, to find new ways to support and service the audience that we treasure.”
TUTV children’s initiative programming airs throughout the week. Check out the TUTV website’s schedule for programming information.