Molly Dickinson Shepard and William J. Marrazzo
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A Letter From the Board Chair and the President
Now more than ever, WHYY brings you programs and services that matter. We connect you to the most in-depth and trusted news and information programming available. We give you a front-row seat to the world's very best arts and culture experiences. We provide a safe environment for your children to learn and explore. We invite you to participate in community discussions that go deeper into the issues explored in our award-winning television and radio programs.
Touching your life through technology We did all of this and more in fiscal year 2006 by making it easier than ever for you to access all WHYY content — when and where it is most convenient for you — through analog and digital television, video-on-demand, radio, the Web and podcasting. As you'll see in this interactive report, a hallmark of WHYY's fiscal year 2006 has been the extension of our multimedia platforms to enrich your life and expand your horizons. Trusted news and information WHYY News
& Public Affairs has set a new standard for
political coverage by partnering with the Committee
of Seventy and the Philadelphia Daily News
to launch and produce The Next Mayor, a two-year
multimedia initiative leading up to Philadelphia's
2007 mayoral election. The Next Mayor uses print,
radio, television, a Web site, citizen focus groups
and polling to foster a community dialogue around
the far-reaching issues that are shaping our region's
future.
Welcoming more people to the discussion and bringing fresh ideas to the table are two goals of WHYY's new community news bureau in Dover, Delaware, opening in the fall of 2006. This new state-of-the-art space enables us to provide more and better coverage of government, the cultural arts and other issues and events important to residents of southern Delaware. We will use this additional coverage to broaden content on WHYY Delaware Tonight, which viewers can watch weeknights on TV12 and WHYY digital television and anytime at whyy.org and via Comcast ON DEMAND. Access to the arts WHYY's
launch this fiscal year of two new Arts & Culture
platforms — an HD Radio channel and a new
digital television channel — brings listeners
and viewers even more of the programs they love
and simply cannot find anywhere else on radio or
television.
We continue to build a rich library of regional arts and culture content unlike any other and make it available to the widest possible audience. Our Experience short segments — which can be viewed on TV12 and our digital television channels, at whyy.org, as video podcasts and via video-on-demand — shine a spotlight on this region's cultural gems. Another noteworthy addition to our cultural content library this fiscal year — and WHYY's unique contribution to the citywide celebration of Benjamin Franklin's 300th birthday — was the inventive original production About Benjamin, featuring fresh insights from local scholars. Education for children and adults The foundation
for lifelong learning must be built early, and WHYY's
Children's Service connects with families in our
region all throughout the year by giving adults
the tools they need to prepare young minds for a
bright future. A record number of Children's Service
Outreach Workshops this fiscal year, along with
In the Spirit of Family panel discussions
on a wide range of subjects, empowered parents,
teachers and educators across the tri-state region
to support a child's educational and emotional development.
Our Children's Service and its community partners brought deeper meaning to an issue affecting far too many families today — childhood cancer — by creating a local outreach event around the national television broadcast of the film, A Lion in the House. In addition to hosting an in-studio panel discussion, WHYY produced the hour-long, nationally distributed radio documentary Childhood Lost and Found, which follows the daily struggles and triumphs of three Delaware Valley families coping with childhood cancer. As we move into the next fiscal year, WHYY's Children's Service and Adult Learning Service will collaborate to serve the professional development needs of educators in Delaware through a federally funded e-learning initiative. WHYY's Adult Learning Service continues to make its mark as a national workforce development leader and reach out to the region's underserved populations. Work on the multi-year translation of the adult basic education series GED Connection into Spanish for regional and national distribution progressed this fiscal year, helping students in the Spanish-speaking community to reach their educational goals. In a partnership that extends into FY'07, our Adult Learning Service will work with the Philadelphia Prison System to distribute to inmates GED Connection and Workplace Essential Skills. Opportunities for lifelong enrichment The use
of the creative arts to improve communication and
personalize healthcare was the impetus behind Circle
of Care, co-produced by WHYY Wider Horizons
and its Caring Community Coalition. Following the
television broadcast, WHYY hosted a live town meeting
featuring Circle of Care subjects, renowned
local experts and a studio audience to explore more
deeply the transformative power of the arts in medicine.
WHYY Wider Horizons addresses the needs and interests of our region's baby boomers and retirees through its partnership with the regional Coming of Age initiative. This fiscal year marked the launch of comingofage.org — a comprehensive Web site where people age 50+ can find information on local volunteer and learning opportunities, career, entertainment and life-planning resources and inspirational stories of people taking the next steps in their lives. And WHYY's new Wider Horizons digital television channel gives this growing population even more opportunities for personal and social engagement with its exciting lineup of today's best news and public affairs programs, cooking, gardening and travel series and WHYY's enlightening Civic Space discussions. Your support matters None of
the programs and services we provide to our diverse
communities would be possible without the generous
support of our 105,000 members and countless foundations,
businesses, corporations and government agencies
throughout our region.
We know that having information when and where you need it helps you make important decisions in your life. Your support sends a clear message that in today's increasingly complex and fast-paced world, WHYY's tradition of excellence and trust matters. Molly Dickinson Shepard William J. Marrazzo |
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