School's out
Channel 4 axes TV schools programmes
There have been profound changes made to education over the last few years, with perhaps the most significant being the wide availability of multimedia computers combined with the possibilities afforded by a broadband internet connection. You don't even need to use cables with laptops and wi-fi (barring Panorama scare stories as to its use) either.
Television is all about the shared experience, and recent surveys still indicate that young people are still watching television as much as they were a few years ago. It's also an opportunity to employ a form of "hands-off" education that doesn't require options to be chosen or text to be entered using a computer.
However it's still arguable that video-based education can now be delivered using broadband video and DVD educational packages, although traditional television is still the best means of delivering time-sensitive video content such as current affairs and scientific developments. And of course there's also Teachers' TV repeating Channel 4 schools programming.
But as with the Open University moving in the same multimedia direction, it's a pity that daytime TV programmes of educational merit for adults are being sidelined in favour of what may turn out to be yet more repeats of Location Location Location, and BBC Two may end up being the only popular channel showing something that requires more than one brain cell to watch.
