PBS: An Overview
PBS in Brief
- PBS is a private, nonprofit corporation, founded in 1969, whose members are America’s public TV stations.
- PBS provides quality TV programming and related services to 356 noncommercial stations serving all 50 states, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam and American Samoa.
- PBS oversees program acquisition and provides program distribution and promotion; education services; new media ventures; fundraising support; engineering and technology development; and video marketing.
PBS Member Stations
- 168 noncommercial, educational licensees operate 356 PBS member stations.
- Of the 168 licensees, 87 are community organizations, 56 are colleges/universities, 20 are state authorities and five are local educational or municipal authorities.
PBS Programming Activities
- The National Programming Service (NPS) is the major package of programs that PBS distributes to its member stations. It features television’s best children’s, cultural, educational, history, nature, news, public affairs and science programming.
- Programs distributed on the NPS are produced by PBS stations, independent producers and other sources around the world. PBS does not produce programs.
The Public Television Audience
- PBS is averaging a 1.3 prime time rating during the 2007-2008 season-to-date.**
- More than 65 million people in 40 million households watch public television either on-air or online during an average week, while the majority of American households (55%) – nearly 109 million people – watch over-the-air public television in a month.
- PBS’ primetime audience is significantly larger than many of the commercial channels frequently cited as competitors, including HBO (0.8), History Channel (0.8), Discovery Channel (0.7), CNN (0.7), The Learning Channel (0.6) and Bravo (0.4).
**Source: Nielsen Media Research. Public television prime time AA rating, full day weekly cume, and full day monthly cume, averages from October 2007-May 2008.
Demographics
- The demographic breakdown of PBS’ audience reflects the overall U.S. population with respect to race/ethnicity, education and income.
|
| Race/Ethnicity of HOH* | % of US Population | % of PBS Audience |
| Black | 12.1% | 11.8% |
| Spanish Origin | 10.8% | 10.9% |
|
|
| Education of HOH* |
| | <4 Yrs. High School | 13.9% | 14.2% |
| High School Grad. | 30.3% | 29.1% |
| 1-3 Yrs. College | 27.9% | 26.2% |
| 4+ Yrs. College | 27.9% | 30.4% |
|
|
| Household Income |
| | <$20,000 | 20.4% | 20.2% |
| $20-$39,999 | 22.3% | 21.8% |
| $40-$59,999 | 17.5% | 16.9% |
| $60,000+ | 39.8% | 41.1% |
*HOH = Head of Household
Source: Nielsen Media Research. Public television full day weekly cume, average from October 2007-May 2008
|
Board of Directors
