this one's for the vacant

love-and-radiation:

enjoli:squashed:

The show’s run is ending, Grant explains, because no one — not the station, not PBS, not the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — will put up the several hundred thousand dollars needed to renew the show’s broadcast rights.

Grant says the funding crunch is partially to blame, but the decision to end Reading Rainbow can also be traced to a shift in the philosophy of educational television programming. The change started with the Department of Education under the Bush administration, he explains, which wanted to see a much heavier focus on the basic tools of reading — like phonics and spelling.

I feel old and sad. Is there really no longer room for a show that teaches kids to love books?

If Fred Rogers was around, he could get the funding. They should draw inspiration from that and try to mimic him.

it’s a very sad thought that, as a nation, we’re so obsessed with the competitive numbers game of educational statistics that we’ve forgotten the importance of inspiration in teaching a child. A child - one. i guess i understand that committees don’t - and can’t - think this way, but i miss the rainbow already.