ABSTRACT
Public television has its roots in education. In the early 1950s, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) set aside 242 channels for educational television, mostly in the UHF band. These channels became the earliest noncommercial education television stations, and were mostly supported by the Ford Foundation, community groups, universities, and other educational institutions (Witherspoon, Kovitz, Avery, & Stavitsky, 2000). This grouping was known as National Educational Television and its main activities involved instructional programs for colleges.
