Television

Introduction

The development of educational television was greatly facilitated by a television station license “freeze” between 1948 and 1952, during which the FCC paused during a period of frenzied development in television's early history to engage in a number of important deliberations that would ultimately shape the future of broadcasting. The concept of educational programming was extremely controversial at this time. Commercial broadcasters claimed that the reservation of noncommercial channels was not necessary, because their programs already served the educational needs of the audience. In fact, they argued that broadcasting was too important a resource to entrust to those who had no ...