SANTA PAULA : TV News Show Can Stay in Classrooms

Children at Isbell Middle School in Santa Paula will continue to watch a commercial television news program in the classroom after the district’s governing board backed away from a proposal to end the programs.

Santa Paula Elementary School District’s board of trustees decided not to terminate its contract with the company that offers the program called Channel One despite objections to advertising that was broadcast with the 15-minute news programs.

Teachers at the cash-strapped school said the benefits of the programming far outweigh the two minutes per day of flashy advertisements.

As part of the agreement with Knoxville, Tenn.-based Whittle Communications, the company provides classrooms with $60,000 worth of equipment, including television sets for each classroom, a satellite dish and two video cassette recorders.

“I can’t imagine going back,” said Mary Stillman, who teaches eighth grade at the school. “It would be crazy to give up all that equipment. I’m remembering how I had to carry my TV and VCR from home whenever I wanted to show an educational tape.”

The board signed an agreement with Whittle Communications almost three years ago and at the time was one of just a handful of schools in California subscribing to the service. Nearly 100 public schools in California now broadcast Channel One in the classroom, and about 12,000 schools nationwide participate.

Whittle reportedly receives about $156,000 for each 30-second commercial, and was projected to gross approximately $90 million from the service last year.

The California Teachers Assn. has been a strong opponent of allowing commercial television into public schools, but no teachers spoke against it at the board meeting Thursday night.

School board trustee Gene Marzec who pushed to end the contract, echoed concerns of the association at the meeting.

“We already know kids watch too much TV,” he said. “We know the parents are probably telling them to turn it off and go do their homework, and then they come into school and the first thing they do is sit down and watch TV.”