Sesame Workshop
Sesame Workshop, Inc. (SW), originally known as the Children's Television Workshop, Inc. (CTW), is an American nonprofit organization that has been responsible for the production of several educational children's programs—including its first and best-known, Sesame Street—that have been televised internationally. Television producer Joan Ganz Cooney and foundation executive Lloyd Morrisett developed the idea to form an organization to produce Sesame Street, a television series which would help children, especially those from low-income families, prepare for school. They spent two years, from 1966 to 1968, researching, developing, and raising money for the new series. Cooney was named as the Workshop's first executive director, which was termed "one of the most important television developments of the decade."[4]
Founded
May 20, 1968
13-2655731
- New York City, US
Worldwide
Sherrie Westin
Sesame Street Inc
Sesame Workshop Communications Inc
Sesame Workshop Initiatives India PLC
SS Brand Management Shanghai
US$104,728,963
US$111,255,622
813
Children's Television Workshop (CTW) (1968–2000)
Sesame Street premiered on National Educational Television (NET) as a series run in the United States on November 10, 1969, and moved to NET's successor, the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), in late 1970. The Workshop was formally incorporated in 1970. Gerald S. Lesser and Edward L. Palmer were hired to perform research for the series; they were responsible for developing a system of planning, production, and evaluation, and the interaction between television producers and educators, later termed the "CTW model". The CTW applied this system to its other television series, including The Electric Company and 3-2-1 Contact. The early 1980s were a challenging period for the Workshop; difficulty finding audiences for their other productions and a series of bad investments harmed the organization until licensing agreements stabilized its revenues by 1985.
Following the success of Sesame Street, the CTW developed other activities, including unsuccessful ventures into adult programs, the publications of books and music, and international co-productions. In 1999, the CTW partnered with MTV Networks to create an educational channel called Noggin. The Workshop produced a variety of original series for Noggin, including The Upside Down Show, Sponk! and Out There. On June 5, 2000, the CTW changed its name to Sesame Workshop[5] to better represent its activities beyond television.
By 2005, income from the organization's international co-productions of the series was $96 million. By 2008, the Sesame Street Muppets accounted for $15–17 million per year in licensing and merchandising fees. As of 2021, Sherrie Westin is the Workshop's president.
History[edit]
Background[edit]
During the late 1960s, 97% of all American households owned a television set, and preschool children watched an average of 27 hours of television per week.[6] Early childhood educational research at the time had shown that when children were prepared to succeed in school, they earned better grades and learned more effectively. Children from low-income families, however, had fewer resources than children from higher-income families to prepare them for school. Research had shown that children from low-income, minority backgrounds tested "substantially lower"[7] than middle-class children in school-related skills, and that they continued to have educational deficits throughout school.[8] The topic of developmental psychology had grown during this period, and scientists were beginning to understand that changes of early childhood education could increase children's cognitive growth.