Channel One To Other Schools And Teachers example essay topic

For donating all of this equipment free of charge, K- ask the schools to have all students watch their daily news show. The show lasts for 12 minutes each and every day. During the news show Channel One attempts to keep our children informed about current issues and events of the day. Watching a 12-minute telecast does not sound like a very high price to pay considering all of the needed equipment K- has donated. Why so much upheaval? For all of the advantages we gain from Channel One, quite a few drawbacks are found.

One of the major disadvantages, the material shown during this 12 minute broadcast, has been brought to the attention of the Federal Government. There is news shown during this broadcast, for 58% of the time allotted (Channel One Emphasizes Ads over Knowledge). The newscasts our tax dollars are paying for last for a total of roughly six and a half minutes. For the remainder of the 12-minute broadcast they televise Ads, a news quiz, promotional activities, music, and banter between the anchors (Channel One Emphasizes Ads over Knowledge).

During those six and a half minutes of news, they show news for only 20% of the time (Channel One Emphasizes Ads over Knowledge). The rest of the time, Channel One shows sports, weather, and natural disasters (Channel One Emphasizes Ads over Knowledge). More than 40% of the teens in the United States watch Channel One every weekday morning. That is more than the viewers for the Super Bowl (The Center for a new American Dream).

To advertisers this is an untapped gold mine. The companies advertising on Channel One pay the price for that air, too. For a 30 second spot, advertisers pay between $185,000 and $200,000 (Study Says Commercialism Rampant in Public Schools). Commercials aired on Channel One range from clothes and shoes, beverages, and even movies. Movies being advertised are not a major problem.

However, considering Channel One is shown in middle schools, as well as high schools, the same broadcast is shown for the entire network. The problems have risen due to some of the content of the advertisements. Some of the movies advertised include very violent content. K- Communications have advertised movies like The World is not Enough, the latest, and some have said the most violent, James bond movie (Study!

Says commercialism Rampant in Public Schools). Pat Ellis, Education director for Obligation, Inc., a child advocacy and media watchdog, was quoted as saying, The ad for The Mummy was filled with gun violence, deaths, and even a hanging scene (Study Says commercialism Rampant in Public Schools). In defense of the program, Channel One spokeswoman Claudia Peters dismissed the research results as irrelevant. Channel one, she said, has been evaluated and reviewed by educators in 12,000 schools nationwide and renewed at a rate of 99%. A recent study by the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan found that 93% of all teachers would recommend Channel One to other schools and teachers (Channel One Emphasizes Ads over Knowledge). Over the last three years, many school districts have signed contracts with soft-drink giants like Coca-Cola and Pepsi Co, in which vending machines in hallways function as glowing billboards for their brands.

A math textbook published in 1995 by McGraw-Hill and approved for use in about 15 states names many consumer products, including Gatorade, Sega and Sony video games and Nike sneakers, in its problems. McGraw-Hill said it received no compensation for the use of the corporate names (Hays). The Nation described a 10-year, $8.4 million contract signed in 1997 with Coca-Cola by School District 11 in Colorado Springs, Colorado, which requires the district to sell 70,000 cases of Coke products per year. The article quoted a letter written by a top District 11 official to school administrators, urging them to increase sales of Coke in their schools to meet sales goals. The letter "instructed principals to allow students virtually unlimited access to coke machines and to move the machines to where they would be accessible to students all day. Commercial activities in U.S. public elementary and secondary schools have been growing in visibility throughout the last decade, a period characterized by tightened school budgets.

As visibility has increased, so have concerns about commercial activities that generate cash, equipment, or other types of assistance and their potential effects on students learning and purchasing behavior. Big business spends over $2 billion dollars a year on advertising directed at children, over 20 times the amount spent just ten years ago (Reese). Mr. George Miller stated it best when he said, Lets not pretend this is child's play. This is not some benevolent effort to give away computers. This is a cold, calculating effort to make customers out of children (Hays).

Advertisement is around us and there is no escape from it. Advertisement should not have such a big influence on children's brains; therefore, psychologists should first determine which advertisements cause negative effects on children and then find the ways to change this situation. Children are our future and they should not be subject to a negative informational influence.

Bibliography

Casey, Jim. Advertisement in our Homes, James & Sons Publishers, 1994 USA: New Report Examines Commercialism in Schools, L.
Hays, New York Times, September 14, 2000 Casey Allan.
Make your school an ad free zone. Adbusters magazine 13 January 2000 web Kline, Stephen.
Out of the Garden: Toys and Childrens Culture in the Age of TV Marketing, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999 McLaren, Carrie.