Toward a Civil Society: Bernarr Cooper and the Bureau of Mass Communications of the New York State Education Department

Introduction

Among the many individuals and agencies who influenced the development of educational television programming stands the distinctive figure of Bernarr Cooper (1912-1999) and the intriguing Bureau of Mass Communications of the New York State Education Department [Figures 1 and 2]. Led by Cooper from 1962 to 1982, the Bureau produced or co-produced more than 1,500 educational programs during its heyday, roughly between 1970 and 1980. Many of these programs were funded by the United States federal government, including the Department of Agriculture, Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (predecessor of the current Department of Health and Human Services), and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The Bureau distributed its programs widely to public schools and libraries across the state of New York, published associated classroom guides for teachers, and formally evaluated many programs to measure their intended impact. It also provided cutting-edge media duplication and distribution services to administrators, librarians, and teachers.

Figure 1:

Bernarr Cooper, ca. 1959-60. Courtesy of the Florida State University Libraries, Special Collections and Archives.

Figure 2:

Logo of the Bureau of Mass Communications, New York State Department of Educucation, ca. 1973.

Courtesy of the New York State Library.

William Hetzer, Project Director in the Bureau, conceived and produced an distinctive animated version of this logo which appeared consistently before of the introductory segments of Bureau-produced programs, as well as some Bureau-distributed programs. Components of the animation included a combination of upbeat clapping sounds and synthesizer music, all likely created through the popular contemporary computerized system called Scanimation. This introduction can be viewed in the American Archive of Public Broadcasting as part of its collection of digitized episodes of the Bureau production Vegetable Soup (1975-1977).

From the earliest days of his career, Cooper had held a clear vision of mass communications and educational technology for the advancement of civil society and the improvement of individual and community health and well-being. With ambition, passion, and tenacity, he honed his vision over time and ultimately implemented it through his leadership of the Bureau, the technologies it supported, and the diverse programming it achieved for communities in New York State, nationwide, and Canada. This article draws the story of Cooper and the Bureau the out of the annals of New York State history, making it meaningful to the interrelated histories of mass communication, educational technology, popular television, and public health.

Historiography

In recent literature, Bernarr Cooper is recognized as a key figure in the history of radio as the medium persisted through the age of television (Keith 14, 24, 41-2, 84, 98, and 145). He also is recognized through his association with Vegetable Soup, the unique, popular, and publicly funded mid-1970s children’s television series which sought to change “the environment for racism” in the United States by teaching younger elementary school students the importance of racial tolerance (Reznick). Cooper led the Bureau’s initiative to secure federal funding to produce Vegetable Soup. Moreover, he was primarily responsible, with Bureau Project Administrator William Hetzer, for selecting Yanna Kroyt Brandt, an accomplished producer and writer, as the executive producer of the series. Cooper served as Project Administrator of the federal grant which funded it, and in this role not only gave Brandt creative latitude to realize Vegetable Soup but also shielded her and her team from the bureaucracy of the grant administration. Reflecting on this period, Hetzer described Cooper as “a force to be reckoned with when it came to creativity and the power of television, especially children’s television” (Hetzer). How Cooper became this force becomes clear upon illuminating his background, ambition, tenacity, cumulative experience and expertise, and various accomplishments with his contemporaries over the arc of his career, from the late 1950s to the early 1980s. Cooper’s professional trajectory over these decades reflected the hallmarks of three distinct periods in the history of educational technology as defined by Victoria Cain based on her original research which extends a substantial historiography (Cain, Cuban, Czitrom, Hoynes, Keeler, Schiller, Simonson, et. al., Saettler, Sloan).

During the period from 1953 to 1962 technocrats like Cooper “saw screens as a catalyst for structural improvement or even revolution in educational systems.” As believers in “screen-based school reform” these individuals “hoped to use screen media technologies to refashion US education along technocratic lines, replacing provincial variations with a single modern system designed and deployed by national experts.” In this way, they “suggested screens could guarantee students equality of opportunity and eliminate what they described as local educational incompetence.” However, these individuals failed “to account for local resistance to outside intervention in education and the difficulty in using screens to reform classroom culture from a distance” (Cain, 44-45). The period from 1962 to 1974, involved “curricula making use of a wide variety of media…to promote student-centered investigation and deep engagement with academic subject matter.” It also saw the commensurate “distrust of educators’ abilities and motives…about the misuse of the decade’s films, filmstrips, and other materials among such activists” and “protests” which “led to angry public discussions of schools’ roles and responsibilities in citizenship training and civic life” (Cain, 76-77). Echoing the interwar period of “civic spectatorship,” when “champions of educational technology argued that school screens were essential tools for training future citizens” (Cain, 3), the period from 1969 to 1992 involved “policy makers and urban education reformers…suggest[ing] that television might help to solve educational problems posed by racism, poverty, and generational alienation.” However, by the late 1980s, “classroom teachers’ use of television had largely lost its progressive edge.” This outcome was due to the atrophy of “the nation’s commitment to desegregation and educational equity” as well as “funding for informal educational television programs and inventive classroom media projects” (Cain, 106-107).

Reconstructing Cooper’s career through these periods reveals his intersection with their associated hallmarks. The resulting history prompts several questions which can help to shape further research, indeed a more detailed portrait of Cooper and the Bureau: How precisely did he navigate the abovementioned periods and evidently prevail in his work? Who were his professional allies and enemies in his field and beyond in the public and private sectors? What alliances did he build, change when circumstances required, and sustain to realize his accomplishments? What strategies did he employ in the face of obstacles he encountered, and criticisms levelled at his arguments and positions? How many of the more than 1,500 productions he and his colleagues created at the Bureau are still extant today? (Orgeron, et. al). How effective locally, regionally, and more broadly were these various programs? Answering these many questions—indeed constructing an even more detailed history of Cooper and the Bureau—requires further research and more relevant sources coming to light for study. Here, then, is just the beginning of an individual and institutional portrait which brings into focus an intriguing figure who led an equally intriguing public agency.

Beginnings and Background

Born in Brooklyn in 1912, Cooper earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1932 from Wabash College, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. During World War II, he served as a lieutenant United States Army, and from 1945 to 1946 he completed postgraduate coursework at the University of Michigan. From 1946 to 1949, he served as an advisor and consultant to the Broadcasting Corporation of Japan on the production of educational, informational, and entertainment broadcasts. From 1949 to 1952, he advised the United Nations on the building, staffing, and broadcasting of twelve radio stations in the Korean and Chinese prisoner of war educational program. This latter experience was transformative for Cooper.

Upon returning to the United States in 1952, Cooper became a high school teacher in Belmont, California, while he pursued his doctorate in speech and drama at Stanford University based on his experiences overseas. As a product of his studies, he published “The Battle for Minds” in the journal World Affairs (Cooper, 1954). The article detailed his work formulating and producing educational programs for 150,000 Chinese and Korean POWs “who had previously fought on the side of the communist-controlled North Korean Army.” Herein, Cooper asked: “What, then, were some of the ideas which a handful of Americans attempted to project upon the thinking of the 150,000 prisoners of war, some of whom were the ‘guests’ of the United Nations Command from 1950 to September 1953?” Answering this question, he stated that “what happened should be understood by every thinking American who is interested in what can be done to influence intelligently the mind of man, and to make him a better citizen in the community of nations.” He elaborated on the principles and practices underpinning the work he and his contemporaries sought to achieve:

The Americans reasons that their concern with the prisoner of war should not be with him as a prisoner, but rather as a human being who would again become a civilian, and a potential contributor to community life. Why not teach him the fundamentals of democracy by teaching him the responsibility of the individual to the community, the community to the nation, and the nation to the other nations of the world? If once this could be done, perhaps a small chink could be made in the communist’s self-satisfaction as a propagandist. But more important, perhaps a new concept of democratic thinking could lead to a better life for each of the prisoners of war, and new recruits could be added to the battle for democracy.

In this effort to “broaden the horizons of thought” of the prisoners, Cooper and his colleagues designed and implemented a variety of education programs, from “literacy courses for the illiterate group” to “vocational training” including “blacksmithing, tin-smithing, potter-making, wood-working, tailoring, and shoe-repairing,” as well as farming on experimental farm plots. Classes in various “social studies” complemented this program of vocational education, including not only language-appropriate texts and teaching plans but also “suggested use of audio-visual aids such as posters, in-class mock radio broadcasts, one-act plays, films and film strips” [Figure 3]. Within this overall “program of preparing the prisoner of war for return to civilian life as a pro-democratic, contributing member of society,” radio broadcasting “to the extent of four to six hours per day” was a major emphasis even as it “was carried on by a staff with little previous experience in the field of mass communications media” (Cooper, 1954, 42). As Cooper explained in detail:

Figure 3:

Bernarr Cooper (right) with Kinshiro Iwao, in the role of MacBeth during one of the first radio programs of the Information and Education Section, General Headquarters of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, Tokyo, Japan, ca. 1950. Courtesy of Shutterstock, Inc.

The staff of each radio station was made up of civilian Korean employees, hired in South Korea, and enlisted personnel of the American Army with either some previous technical radio expertise, or an aptitude for it. A method or training and programming was devised by an American and supervised by him to compensate for the lack of previous experience on the part of members of the camp staff. From a central emanating point in each camp, via telephone lines, and an average of two amplifiers and loudspeakers in each compound of five hundred prisoners, a variety of broadcasting went to the prisoners of war. News, music of the western as well as the oriental world, comedy programs and dramas were the general content. To the prisoner of war, the broadcasts seemed to be a mixture of entertainment, education, and information.

Cooper explained further that this variety of radio programming included “a series of half-hour, once-a-week, semi-documentary broadcasts” based squarely on “one factor,” namely “national pride,” which was understood to be “as old as time itself for the man behind barbed wire…carefully nurtured and handed down by word of mouth, from generation to generation, among the less literate.” The aim of this series was therefore to:

give direction to the prisoner of war’s attitude of tremendous national pride by presenting dramatized versions of the lives of great figures from Chinese and Korean history who had fought for one or another of the basic freedoms. The immediate objective was to appeal to the human need among the prisoners of war for recognition and acceptance within the community to which they would go. What the prisoners of war had done, in refusing to return to their homelands, was so contrary to oriental tradition, that there was a constant need for reassurance and mutual approval. By presenting a figure in the prisoner’s national history, and, in effect, saying to the prisoner, ‘This man or woman sacrificed much to live his belief in such-and-such a freedom. You, too, are a great figure, for you, too, have sacrificed much to show that you are steadfast in your resistance to the evil of communism,’—by saying only this, the Americans brought encouragement and revitalization to a commitment made by the prisoners of war. A commitment which the harshness and deadliness of a routine of life behind barbed wire, could quickly dull.

To this description, Cooper added two facts: that “every broadcast of the series was a signal for a spontaneous post-broadcast discussion among the prisoners of war,” and that “the actual broadcast was produced, directed, performed and backed with sound and music provided by the prisoners of war, themselves.”

“The Battle for Minds” paved the way to Cooper’s full doctoral thesis, “Radio Broadcasting to Chinese and Korean POWs: A Rhetorical Analysis” (Cooper, 1956). Together, these works represented the core of his early arguments and thinking about the potential of education and technology in building and sustaining civil society. Notably, during the same period, colleagues in the field began to recognize Cooper’s experience and expertise. In his 1957 book Heroes Behind Barbed Wire, Kenneth K. Hansen documented the rehabilitation of Chinese and North Korean POWs who remained in South Korea after the armistice. According to Hansen, Bernarr Cooper stood among the “rehabilitation heads” who “distinguished themselves” in this work (Hansen, 130; “Dr. Bernarr Cooper Mentioned in Book,” “Cooper is Mentioned in Book on Koreans”).

University of New Mexico

In 1957, Cooper left California to become Assistant Professor of Speech and Director of Educational TV and Radio at the University of New Mexico, under the Division of Extension, Summer Session, and Community Services. Here, he taught a variety of courses, including “Introduction to Radio and Television,” “Production Procedures in Radio and Television,” and “Advanced Radio Production,” and “Radio Writing” (Directory of College Courses, 25). He also became general manager of one of the earliest educational television (ETV) stations in the United States, namely KNME-TV Channel 5 of the Regents of the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, and the Board of Education of the City of Albuquerque. Cooper led increased programming of the station, including lectures by the faculty which were “kinescoped and sent to the eight participating cities where monitor teachers gathered with students to view and study the film” (“Workings of U TV Station Are Interesting, Confusing”). Moreover, Cooper led KNME in receiving the approval, in May 1958, from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to broadcast on open circuit, only a little more than six months after its original permit was granted by the FCC (“TV Station Sets Broadcast Record”).

At KNME, Cooper was a local and regional leader with national and forward-thinking perspectives on broadcast media informed substantially by his overseas experiences. Reflective of his views during this period was his insightful article “Assessing the Future in Educational Television,” wherein he asked “How can television best serve the educational needs for the future?” (Cooper, 1958). To answer this question, Cooper addressed various “potentials and limitations of the television medium,” and he observed that “our educational system has made us the victims of specialists and compartmentalization.” He continued:

There is little attempt to plan in depth, interrelationships between areas of learning. Often at the college level we produce college trained people who are only that—college trained—but in the true sense of the meaning are not educated, or are, at best, poorly educated. There are many noble experiments in attempting to relate areas of learning to each other through a classification known as the “humanities.” The student is encouraged to investigate the interrelationships of bodies of knowledge, one with the others. However, in our scientific age, the pursuit of the “humanities” does not always equate with the idea of adequate professional preparation, in the student’s mind.

Moreover, Cooper explained:

We live in a highly complicated society. Indeed, it has become more increasingly complicated in democracies where great advances are made. Many of these advances are made in scientific areas, and these scientific achievements in turn influence us in every walk of life and at every moment of our lives. Thus, it becomes necessary that we understand the interrelationships and possible daily application of all areas of knowledge. Perhaps we must first recognize that we must get away from the idea that television can teach only rote content subject matter. True, rote content subject matter is necessary to a basic education. But we must stimulate to thought as well as impart basic information. Perhaps our educational system is weak in that we have not yet removed ourselves from the idea that the sole goal of education is to impart information.

In “the final analysis,” Cooper concluded, “we return again to the question: What shall we do with this medium for all citizenry, of all ages, or whatever their previous learning experience?” In answering this question, Cooper further echoed the theme of “broadening horizons of thought” which characterized his 1954 article “The Battle for Minds,” writing that:

If we are to recognize that man must be an integrated human being, widely learned in many subject content areas, capable of taking such basic learning and advancing it to a point of positive thought for greater good for himself, his immediate family, or his community situation—if this is to be the goal of education, then perhaps we must recognize that more planning in depth must take place in educational telecasting. Planning the educational future of a democracy must help the individual to a realization of the interrelationship of all areas of knowledge. Certain satisfactions must be attained in life. Perhaps life moves too fast to attain them all, but each individual has a right to a place in his own small world. But his own small world is no longer as small as it was twenty-five, fifty, a hundred years ago. Man, by his very achievements, has enlarged the area of necessary knowledge. What is needed today on an ordinary day-to-day living basis in order to be able to attain some of the desirable goals in life, is much more than the knowledge necessary fifty years ago.

Cooper’s “Assessing the Future of Educational Television” reflected the expansion of his contemporary philosophy and practice as an educator attuned to the potential of new educational technologies. Ironically, his use of the term “noble experiment” presaged one of his greatest achievements as leader of the Bureau of Mass Communications: his support of the creation of the aforementioned Vegetable Soup which was hailed in its day as “a noble experiment in human values” (Didato). This series was one among more than 1,500 that would constitute the diverse and dynamic programming of the Bureau which sought to build, sustain, and advance civil society with a particular focus on individual and community health and well-being. Indeed, Cooper’s accomplishments overseas, and as an educator and emerging leader in educational television, positioned him well for the next chapter of his career as an associate professor of media and director of the Television and Radio Program at Florida State University in Tallahassee.

Florida State University

During his time at Florida State, Cooper participated in a number of professional activities locally, regionally, and with the National Association of Educational Broadcasters (NAEB), all of which reflected his increasing engagement and respect in the field of mass communications. In the spring of 1960, the NAEB appointed him as a reviewer of new literature in the field of radio and television” (Cooper, 1958, “NAEB Committee and Members-1961”). Subsequently, the Tallahassee Democrat featured Cooper’s professional mentorship of a colleague in the field after he was awarded a fellowship to study educational television [Figure 4]. In 1961, the NAEB invited him to interview “outstanding authorities in educational broadcasting for a 30-minute documentary,” entitled “The Power of Educational Broadcasting,” for distribution to “more than 200 educational radio stations” (“Dr. Bernarr Cooper Will Interview For TV Program”). However, the most significant professional activity Cooper undertook during this period was publishing “The Use of Television for Education in Times of Conflict” in the journal Communication Quarterly (Cooper, 1960). In part a review of Robert M. Allen 1958 book Television, Education and the Armed Forces, the piece extended ideas Cooper had articulated in his previous publications, strengthening the bridge he had been building between his experiences overseas and his contributions in the field of mass communications.

Figure 4:

“E-TV Fellowship,” Tallahassee Democrat (June 19, 1960), p.16.

© Tallahassee Democrat – USA TODAY NETWORK.

“Much has been written,” Cooper began “and many experiments in learning and teaching have been conducted, in that area designated (for want of a better term) ‘Utilization.’ In evaluating teaching approaches related to broadcast media, there is little evidence to indicate that the theories of propaganda and propaganda analysis have yet been related to television and radio.” He explained further:

Propaganda content and analysis of it is often treated as a distinct and sociologically unrelated methodology—unrelated that is to the business of writing, directing, and producing for radio and television. We rarely extract from mass communications research principles which we can apply in the classroom. Indeed, soul-searching in the area of what may or may not have been accomplished during the last five years in ‘Mass Communications Research’ has left many an educational televisionist and experimental designer with the conclusion that what is known is relatively limited, and what is limited perhaps presents a need to re-evaluate some of the experimental designs which have led to that broad if indeterminate conclusion: ‘No significant difference.’

Cooper continued:

However, both the propagandist and the teacher find that apparently in subjective terms, a ‘significant difference’ does exist. And it is these ‘differences,’ reflecting as they do social patterns and awareness of the uses to which knowledge can be put, that seem to have implication in a society faced with problems of ideological emergence and growing populations that make increasing claim upon the economic potential of those nations which attempt to serve their demanding populations.

Clarifying his argument, Cooper explained that while “the propagandist is concerned with effecting attitudinal changes in the target group, the educator is concerned with increasing the basic information of the student and, hopefully, moving the student from the position of a creature of little knowledge to one capable of using basic information as a means to enlarging his vision of the world in which he lives.” Therefore, Cooper, argued “the objectives of both the propagandist and the educator are not too dissimilar, and indeed depend upon the broad dissemination of information to accomplish the goals which should hopefully be those of ‘thinking men in growing social milieus.’” Moreover, Cooper explained, “knowing one’s political and geographical neighbor thus becomes not only desirable but a necessity in a world whose boundaries are rapidly shrinking and whose peoples need to know better how to live, one with the other, if they are not to destroy each other in the ideological battle for existence.” Based on this reality, and its growing complexity in the modern age, Cooper concluded:

The implications for broad and quick dissemination of information and materials related to other peoples and other places are, then, quite clear. The use of television to accomplish this end presents no problem. The dissemination of information and materials may be at the adult level and may be confined to adding to already known factual knowledge. Or it may be at the basic level of learning, confined to the initial acquisition of knowledge. Adequate samples of such uses of the medium already exist in many communities; and it is only awareness in relating knowledge in the area of ‘Social Studies’ to knowledge in ‘Economic and Historical Developments’ that requires planned integration in presentation and examination.

Intellectually, if not intentionally, Cooper was setting the stage for his next act in the field of mass communications and education, one that took shape less than three years after he arrived at Florida State.

In August 1962, the Tallahassee Democrat announced that Cooper was “taking a year’s leave” beginning on September 1 “to serve as associate in educational television for the University of the State of New York and its State Education Department,” located in Albany, New York (“Cooper Takes Leave for Service in ETV”). There, he was to be “a consultant in developing a broad program in adult and community education by means of television for the state and an adviser in establishing a curriculum in educational television for elementary and secondary schools.” The article also noted that Cooper’s work in New York would be supported by “a total of $350,000 in aid…for the adult program, which will be undertaken through state and private institutions of higher learning” (“FSU Speech Expert is Named Consultant”). Subsequently, the Tallahassee Democrat pointed out that Cooper’s work would involve “the setting up of a 31-station education television network in the state” and “planning for closed circuit broadcasts to public schools, teacher training workshops, closed circuit broadcasts to institutions of higher learning and an experiment in 2000 megacycle broadcasting at Plainedge, NY [involving low-power educational signals on an ultra-high frequency UHF band transmitted to schools via antennas]” (“The Plainedge ETV System”). Cooper embarked on this considerable scope of work involving a unit he would soon direct, namely the Bureau of Mass Communications.

Bureau of Mass Communications

The Bureau was one of two units within the Department of Educational Communications of the New York State Education Department; the other was the Bureau of Classroom Communications. The Bureau of Mass Communications was primarily concerned with supporting “local assistance for educational television, the development of educational councils and program[s] for the use and implementation of educational television in institutions of higher learning” (Cooper, 1966). The Bureau of Classroom Communications was primarily concerned with “conventional audiovisual activities, programmed instruction, electronic classrooms, computer assisted instruction, school building design, communications research, and demonstration, graphic communications, and curriculum implementation” (Twyford, 33).

Connecting both units and informing their complementary roles was the emergence of ETV as a substantial enterprise in New York state, with roots in the 1940s when “a small unit [of the state] promoted school use of audio-visual aids, including the new media of film, radio, and television” (A History of Educational Television in New York State). Thereafter, the State Education Department fostered the development of educational and public television services in New York. In 1953, the Regents obtained seven FCC permits for UHF channels; under a law passed the next year the Regents chartered ETV councils to operate the stations. After successful closed-circuit and broadcast ETV experiments, state aid authorized in 1961 helped over a thousand schools purchase and use ETV equipment during the decade which coincided with the first decade of Cooper’s leadership of the Bureau. Indeed, as Lee Campion, Director of Educational Communication, explained in 1963:

I believe we have quite a unique plan for state-wide television. I know of no other state who has approached it quite in the way we have approached it. The Division of Educational Communications [of which the Bureau was a part] is working to develop all types of ETV systems: systems for the community, open circuit for general education, and 2500 megacycle systems for higher education and the public schools. All are producing materials that will go into a video-tape library. A duplicating service will extend these materials throughout the state. The emphasis must be on quality. We will try to answer some of the criticisms of mediocracy in production by concentrating on fewer programs with more quality” (Campion, 5).

Campion was prescient in his observations, anticipating a major chapter in Cooper’s professional life during which we would defend his leadership of the Bureau with gusto.

Professional Engagement

Cooper’s continuous engagement in the field of mass communications was a hallmark of his leadership of the Bureau. During the summer of 1963, he consulted on a three-week workshop at Hofstra University, sponsored by the Long Island ETV Council under contract with the New York State Education Department, directed by Frank Iezzi of Hofstra, and taught by Stanley Handleman of Brooklyn College. His fellow consultants included Worthington Gregory, Director of Radio at Sewanhaka High School, and Robert Hilliard of the University of North Carolina’s Department of Radio, Television and Motion Pictures. Hilliard had recently asked Cooper to contribute to his book Understanding Television: An Introduction to Broadcasting, an invitation which Cooper accepted. The result was a chapter on “Producing” wherein Cooper addressed “one of the most anomalous terms in all of television” which “depending on whether one is talking to the top echelon of administration in one of the networks, an advertising agency media man, or a performer on a particular program, one may run a whole gamut of adjectives and expletives.” Hastings House published Hilliard’s book in 1964 when Cooper’s “educational and communications experience” had included “broadcasting and utilization training of more than 165,000 teachers in three countries and in four languages” (Hilliard, 86).

Later in 1963, Cooper participated with four hundred colleagues in the first Educational Communications Convocation jointly sponsored by the Division of Educational Communications of the New York State Education Department, New York Audiovisual Council, and New York State Educational Radio and Television Association (Cooper, 1963). He offered two presentations, “Federal Funds for Educational Television” and “Inter-Institutional Television.” Notably, the former and its subsequent “informal discussions” involved Cooper devoting “major emphasis to pointing out that the implication [of Public Law 87-447 involving federal funds for ETV] was to aid new stations to come into being” as well as to “make it possible for stations already in existence to extend transmission facilities to provide additional coverage, incorporating within that coverage not only considerable numbers of viewers not previously reached, but also making possible the extension of an educational service for upgrading viewers’ knowledge with programs” ranging from “general information, broadly cultural, and/or direct instructional, at all levels, kindergarten through higher institutional” (Cooper, 1963, 47).

During the following year, 1965, Cooper joined educational experts from around the country in a meeting sponsored by the FCC to establish a formal committee to help guide the development of Instructional Television Fixed Service (ITFS). As the announcement about the meeting in the Federal Register explained:

The growth of [these] systems throughout the country, especially in urban areas, and the incipient shortage of channels in some areas because of uncoordinated planning suggest the need to establish national and regional groups of educators interested in the ITFS to achieve effective utilization of these channels, and to provide information to both the Commission and to education at large on the development of ITFS (Instructional Television Fixed Service).

Cooper contributed to the committee as its Northeast Regional Chairman. Through this experience, he soon edited ITFS—Instructional Television Fixed Service—What It is—How to Plan, a publication which further registered his expertise and his leadership in the field (Cooper, 1967). Moreover, he testified publicly on matters of urgent concern to the committee above all Community Antenna Television (CATV). Cooper argued that educational communities across the country should be empowered with the knowledge that these privately owned systems operated under a franchise granted by local government—indeed they were not public utilities—and to leverage this knowledge to advocacy to “harness this valuable community resource in the service of your schools.” As Cooper stated on September 22, 1970, to the Standing Committee on Corporations, Authorities, and Commissions of the New York State Assembly Concerning Community Antenna Television:

It is the belief of many colleagues in the educational community that education’s need for an equitable availability of the channels of any CATV system is best expressed and satisfied at the local level where CATV franchises are sought, and granted. To accomplish this, however, a state level policy must be articulated that gives to every citizen the advantage of educational, instructional and community expression of thought and opinion (Statement by Bernarr Cooper Before the Standing Committee, 1973).

The following year, 1971, Cooper stated before the FCC Committee Concerning Community Antenna Television that “underscoring” the action of the New York State legislature to develop and implement “a public communications policy” around CATV was

the recognized awareness that American education stands at the crossroad of mounting learner opportunity and need, and the lack of increasing available public funds to meet such learning needs. High on the list of the [Board of] Regents [of the State of New York] educational priorities are such recognized elements as the right of every American to an acceptable level of reading competency, and the Commission of Education’s recognition and encouragement of the establishment of an external degree program. The right-to-read and the indispensable right-to-know seem paramount. The policies related to telecommunications and to cable transmission, in particular, will emerge during the next months or years, will determine to a large extent what can be done to aid the education of the citizens of our nation” (Statement by Bernarr Cooper Before the Federal Communications Commission, 1973).

New York soon became the second state, after Massachusetts, to establish a comprehensive scheme of state supervision of local franchising procedures for CATV (Lapierre). In 1973, Cooper worked with colleagues in the Bureau of Mass Communications to organize and convene the Regents CATV Conference. The purposed of the meeting was “to bring together municipal and town officials with chief school and higher education administrators to examine the potential of the use of cable television to meet educational and instructional needs.” Its “thrust…was to provide insights and indicate opportunities which would help to shape the use of cable and permit its use for local level action and community need” (Regents Cable Television Conference, iii). In 1977, to help communities even further to make the most of CATV, Cooper’s Bureau of Mass Communication published the Cable Television Handbook for Community Planning (Cable Television Handbook).

Through his leadership of the Bureau and his continuous professional engagement, Cooper effectively set out to address the question he posed at the outset of his 1958 article “Assessing the Future of Educational Television,” that is “How can television best serve the educational needs for the future?” (Bulletin). Beyond advocacy and empowerment through open knowledge of public service, technology, and the law, Cooper’s answer to this question involved the production of a variety of educational programs and distribution of them across New York State, and beyond its borders, in libraries and schools at all levels: elementary, secondary, and post-secondary. A contemporary information booklet about the Bureau clearly and creatively described this mission and the interrelated categories of work and partnerships being undertaken by Cooper and his colleagues. Its front cover illustrated and pages illustrated by perspectives on the Bureau’s technology, the booklet opened with description of “mass communication,” involving “cable television, space satellite stations, instructional television fixed services, and radio and television stations.” It followed with a description of the Bureau’s cooperative production of educational programs, an explanation of its leadership of the “Programming Aid from Commercial Television Catalog” (PACT), and an overview of its “video and audio tape duplication” services. A page dedicated to the Bureau’s “special services” came next, explaining how such services are “continually expanded to keep pace with new forms and concepts in media technology.” The booklet concluded with an a focus on the Bureau’s support of state public television stations (PTVs:, including “underwriting the basic cost of an open-circuit school television instructional service, providing operating grants to each PTV station, assisting in funding capital development costs, providing program assistance, cooperative involvement with statewide programming, and developing and maintaining a consultation services for all PTV councils and associations in the state” [Figures 5–12].

Figures 5-12:

Informational booklet, Contents of a Bureau of Mass Communications (ca. 1973).

Courtesy of the New York State Library.

Productions of the Bureau

During its heyday under Cooper’s leadership, approximately between 1970 and 1980, the Bureau produced or co-produced more than 1,500 educational programs that were notable for their timely subjects and intended impact: to advance civil society and improve individual and community health and well-being. The Bureau published associated teacher guides [Figures 13–16], as well as quantitative and qualitative evaluations which sought to measure the effects of programs on their audiences. One of its most popular programs was the award-winning Vegetable Soup (1975-1977) which taught younger elementary school students the importance of racial tolerance. Luberta Mays, EdD, led formal evaluations of the series, revealing its overall effectiveness and resulting in praise from contemporary researchers (Graves, Mays, Reznick). Among the many other productions and co-productions of the Bureau were:

Figures 13-16:

Selected publications associated with the Bureau productions/co-productions

The Government Story (1969), Man Builds—Man Destroys (1973-74), The Mars Adventure (1977), and High Feather (1980). All courtesy of the Education Resources Information Center, Institute of Education Science, U.S. Department of Education, except High Feather, which is from the collection of the author.

• Once Upon a Day (1965), an educational television series of children ages four to seven, funded by the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education, and starring Georgine Hall and Laura Webber who, as Cooper explained in the teacher’s guide for this program, “lead the young viewer along the paths of discovery and participation in the world around them” (Nathanson, n.p.).

• Children of the World (1968), co-produced with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and United National Children’s Fund. Consisting of nine television programs for elementary students, this series “roams the globe searching for illuminating portraits of young people,” Cooper explained in his foreword to the teacher’s guide for this program. “A child’s life in a foreign culture often reflects those, similarities and differences that exist for all human beings on this planet earth. Each presentation has been beautifully photographed and may been enjoyed by a viewer of any age; although, special attention is given to the elementary and intermediate social studies student” (Larson, iii-iv).

• The Government Story: A Series of Forty Television Programs about the American System of Government (1969), which Cooper described as a “a unique television series designed for all Americans…[which] provides insights to the human and institutional apparatus and functions of the legislative, executive, and judicial arms of the Federal Government. He explained further: “This outstanding group of documentary programs was inspired by a dedicated and determined group of wives of Congressmen and government leaders who wanted to harness the resources of television to educate Americans on the history of their government and how it works” (The Government Story, iii-iv).

• Families of the World (ca. 1973), produced chiefly by Nippon Hoso Kyokai (NHK), the Japanese Broadcasting Company, in cooperation with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and involving the Bureau which helped to make the series available in English for the first time, its “soundtracks… translated and completely revised for a more exciting and meaningful experience for American viewers, and its “content…designed to harmonize with current trends in social studies teaching.” The series consisted of thirty minute television programs designed for elementary children which “document the changing role of the family by depicting every day family life in five representative countries throughout the developing world: India, Zambia, Thailand, Turkey, and Costa Rica” (Families of the World: iii-iv).

• Man Builds—Man Destroys (1973-74), co-produced with the United Nations with support of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education, this series “taught audiences of all ages sound environmental conservation practices.” In accompanying guide to this program, written by Osborn Segerberg, Jr., Cooper explained further that it was:

  conceived as a series of action and information presentations on the need for environmental change. Designed to present realities of action that men may take anywhere in the world, to help preserve the limited resources of this planet, the series has drawn on the thought, the well-intentioned advice, and the dedication of many of the world’s concerned ecologists” (Segerberg, iii) This series received a Fair of Rome Film Festival award.

• Perspectives in Social Studies (1975), developed by the New York State Education Department and the American Broadcasting Company with support of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, this series of seven, thirty minute television programs for middle and secondary school students were “designed around the inquiry/discovery approach which involve students and teachers in an examination of seven significant concepts: urbanization, culture clash, mobility, nationalism, morality, ideology and privacy (Bragaw, vi).

• The Mars Adventure (1977) represented a “joint venture of the Bureau of Mass Communications and the Bureau of General Education Curriculum Development of the New York State Education Department, in cooperation with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).” As Cooper explained in the words of Robert Zimmerman, a colleague in the SED’s Bureau of General Education Curriculum Development, “films and video tapes make it possible for pupils to visit in space—to develop their own concepts of time, and size, and structure. Films and video tapes not only make it possible to supplement the science curriculum but to develop new and exciting curricular adventures—multidisciplinary—multisensory—with an individualization of personalized concept. To visit Mars in films and video tapes is an adventure—to take your students with you can be teaching at its finest” (A Teacher’s Guide, iii-iv).

• High Feather (1980), “a television series about good physical health and its relationship to proper nutrition,” developed with support from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (Mays, 1977, 1). Speaking to the valued research underpinning this series, and to the contributions of its director, Luberta Mays, EdD—who had also successfully evaluated Vegetable Soup—Cooper observed that the “concept of necessary research for the full realization of a television series and its direction is still not a regularly accepted condition of creation and performance. For the most part, the world of commercial television feels that research serves its name and purpose if bodies are counted and ‘likes’ and ‘dislikes’ are ventilated. But the forward-looking public television series has ‘different fish to fry.’ For the public television creator of material it is necessary to know whether the viewers ‘understands.’ If not, what must be done to ‘fix’ the program so that its intrinsic meaning becomes a continuing and progressive aspect of the produced program? Most important, does the program ‘fit’ the level of comprehension of the viewer—whether am adult, an adolescent or an elementary school child?” (Mays, ix).

The Bureau produced or co-produced many other popular programs, including:

• Bread and Butterflies (1975), co-produced with the Association for Instructional Television, which was designed to advance student career development in children ages 9-12 years old;

• The Writer’s Forum (1974), consisting of interviews with 10 major American poets and co-produced with the Rochester Poetry Society, State University of New York College at Brockport, and New York State Council on the Arts;

• ThinkAbout (1980), also co-produced with the Association for Instructional Television, which sought to identify basic approaches to recognizing problems and problem-solving;

• Big Bucks: A Look at Television Commercials and You Have Rights (1980) which sought to educate young viewers about consumerism; and

• AIDS Education: A Cooperative approach (1987) which consisted of interviews and discussions with educators, teachers, students and parents about what, when, and how to teach students about AIDS.

The Bureau distributed many more programs for multiple age groups and representing a variety of subject areas. Overviews of its 1972 and 1980 media duplication and distribution service catalogs reveal this additional diversity and the sheer productivity of his team and collaborators in Albany, across New York State, nationwide, and internationally (Media Duplication and Distribution Service, 1972 and 1980) [Figures 17–18].

Figures 17-18:

Word clouds depicting the variety of subjects of video tapes offered by the Bureau in its 1972 Media Duplication and Distribution Service Video Tape Catalog (above) and its 1980 Media Duplication and Distribution Service Catalog Supplement (below). Creations of the author via WordItOut.

Such variety of programming achieved by the Bureau over the course of nearly a decade, and described by Cooper and his contemporaries in their associated program guides and evaluation reports, testified to his leadership of the organization, to the expertise of those with whom he worked so closely, and to the agency mission of using educational technology to improve the lives of individuals of all ages and backgrounds. Events of 1973—involving the New York State Legislative Commission on Expenditure Review (LCER)—publicly tested Cooper and his record of collaborative accomplishment.

1973: Audit and Advocacy

Established in 1969, and continuing through 1992, the LCER “served as a bipartisan joint legislative agency responsible for evaluating the quality, efficiency, and effectiveness of New York’s executive agencies.” The committee’s “program audits, budget studies, memorandum reports, annual reports, oral presentations, agency responses to reports, and audit closure reports document a high level of legislative oversight” (Haag). With the publication of the LCER’s program audit in March 1973, this oversight touched “the development, organization, operation, programing and financing of educational television (ETV) in New York State” (Roos, et. al., summary). The subsequent “statement in rebuttal” by the Regents of the State University of New York,” published in July, and “comment” by the State Education Department, published in August, suggest the “force” that Cooper was—again in the words of his contemporary William Hetzer—and was indeed likely “reckoned with” as his leadership and his team at the Bureau of Mass Communications came under public scrutiny (Regents Statement, State Education Department Comment, Hetzer).

Audit of the LCER

The LCER’s audit was comprehensive. It began with “a general review of ETV in NYS,” followed by an “investigat[ion of] the effectiveness, material sources, logistical services and productivity of classroom TV at the primary and secondary levels,” and then an “analy[sis of] classroom TV in the State University, including its development, administration, potential utilization, cost-effectiveness and reasons for its current underutilization.” The audit continued with a survey of public television in the state “with attention devoted to its instructional services, public programming, program production services and statewide network,” as well as its “finances, especially PTA station expenses, and state and other sources of funding.” The audit concluded with “an overview and look at the future of ETV, including both its ITV and PTV components,” following by “eleven appendixes” which “provide additional detailed data.”

Although the LCER’s audit stated at the outset that “the State’s ETV systems and facilities are a valuable and extensive educational and cultural asset,” the report concluded that it was “one…not utilized to its expected potential” (Roos, et. al., S-1). Through their site visits to Brockport, Fredonia and New Paltz colleges’ communication centers, investigators found “underutilization of equipment and facilities, substitute uses for studio areas and nominal production of TV courses.” Moreover, the audit revealed, “every communication director interviewed agreed that the centers’ TV and other facilities were underutilized” due to “inadequate operating funds” and “a result of SUNY’s budgetary system” in which “television and other media are treated as a support cost of the campus instructional budget” not as a means to “account for or encourage departments to use media to achieve greater productivity” (Roos, et. al., S-5).

In the area of public television, the audit concluded that the station oversight of the Board of Regents “has been notably weak in two areas,” first because “the SED [State Education Department] did not issue procedures for station fiscal and operational oversight until after a severe fiscal crises at WSKG in Binghamton forced them to do in 1971, twenty years after statutory authorization,” and second because “the SED does not have a systemic procedure for monitoring, evaluating and planning statewide programming and production which encouraged development of a high quality local orientation or statewide utilization.” Moreover, the audit stated that while “the [public television] network has an impressive technical capability and considerable flexibility in its method of providing interconnections,” it “does not yet, however, provide a truly statewide interconnection since it excludes WNYE in New York City and WLIW in Garden City,” and since “full statewide production and distribution potentials are not being realized because of a lack of meaningful cooperation between SED, the network, and the PTV stations” (Roos, et. al., S-5-6).

The conclusions of the audit for “program production”—and directed specifically at the Bureau of Mass Communications—were equally critical:

The Education Department’s Bureau of Mass Communications produces instructional and on-instructional programs for PTV stations as well as instructional programs for classroom use. However, the nature and technical quality of these productions often renders them unsuitable for PTV station consumption…Seven stations reported use of State offered production at zero to six percent of instructional programs. Six stations indicated that they did not use any of the bureau’s non-instructional program offerings.

In conclusion, with regard to “The Future of ETV,” the audit stated that:

A plan for the full utilization of community based ETV does not exist. In the critical area of program production, the Education Department provides little opportunity for local participation and advice regarding content. Concurrently local station production for both instructional and public programming has declined, accompanied by a reliance on non-station or out-of-state program sources supplied via the New York Network. With rapid changes being made in communications technology, public television can no longer be viewed as a medium with a limited audience appeal. The increase in community donations to PTV illustrates that quality public programming is in demand.

Moreover, the audit concluded:

The Board of Regents has not evaluated, defined or planned the comprehensive utilization of the State’s multi-million dollar investment in classroom and public television. PTV stations, schools and BOCES, the Education Department and the State University operate as uncoordinated entities. If this fragmented approach continues, it is difficult. To ascertain how both the technological opportunities and the State’s classroom and cultural production needs can be effectively or efficiently met (Roos, et. al., S-7).

Regents Rebuttal and SED Comment

Following his receipt of the audit from LCER director Dr. Troy R. Westmeyer, Ernest Boyer, Chancellor of State University of New York, wrote on April 12, 1973, that he and his colleagues were “pleased with the information presented, which reflects a continually increasing use of television by students and faculty at our campuses, and we envision using this report to direct us in broadening the effect of such use while increasing its quality” (Roos, et. al., 74). However, the subsequent “statement in rebuttal” to the audit, published in July, offered a harsher view. In it, the Regents argued that the audit “ignored many of the SED’s activities in the area of instructional fixed service television, cable television and satellite communication.” Moreover, the Regents made clear that the Board of Education “denies the accusation that the State Education Department’s programs are of poor technical quality and weak in content, and offer evidence to the contrary.” Additionally, the Regents argued that “the charge that the SED’s supervision of local station operations has been minimal is countered with evidence which indicates actual authority and resources.” And finally, the Regents made clear that the Board of Education “denies the claim that there has been lack of statewide coordination of planning for educational television, citing its plan for total state support of the instructional television programing [sic] of the state’s sight open circuit stations” (Regents Statement in Rebuttal).

Published a month after the Regent’s rebuttal, the State Education Department’s searing “comment” on the LCER audit logically involved Cooper in his role as leader of the Bureau (Ruhl). Here we discern his voice, indeed his advocacy for his organization and his team:

The LCER program audit for Educational Television in New York State exhibits lack of uniformity in staff work and evaluation, exhibited by criticism which is not evenhanded from one agency unit to another. This possibly reflects differing attitudes or competence of investigating staff. In any case, the audit is replete with errors in fact, both historical and statistical, misunderstandings, misrepresentations, innuendoes and unsubstantiated accusations. As published it can be of little or no help to the Legislature which will have to separate the wheat from the chaff before being able to react in informed fashion to the status of ETV in the State.

More specifically, the comment made clear the following major points:

1. The audit has not used facts and accurate statistics provided to staff by the Bureau of Mass Communications.

2. Unique comments and rumors have been accepted as fact without any apparent effort to check these or evaluate the reason for the discrepancies.

3. There is exhibited a lack of understanding of federal legal restrictions and of the Rules and Regulations of the Federal Communications Commission.

4. All units studied are not subjected to equal ground rules of examination. Some activities are reported to March 1, 1973; others do not have their most recent accomplishments or administrative changes recognized.

5. The problems of the Binghamton ETV station and the Department’s role in that situation are consistently misstated and misinterpreted to the disadvantage of the Education Department and of those local citizens and legislators who I cooperated so successfully to reverse the effects and direction of previous malfeasance and mismanagement.

6. No reference was made to Regents Position Paper No. 17, “Instructional Technology,” dated November 1972.

In its introduction, the comment concluded: “All of these have had to be detailed, line by line, in this statement. We can only hope that the damage done by the incompetent evaluation can be partly corrected in the mind of the concerned and objective reader.” The fact that Cooper’s leadership of the Bureau continued productively for nearly another decade, during which the unit achieved the impressive variety of programming described above, suggests that there was minimal, if any, “damage done” to its operations, and his career, as a result of the LCER audit.

Conclusion

Bernarr Cooper’s work in the field of educational television programming, culminating as it did in his leadership of the Bureau of Mass Communications, testifies to a tenacious career dedicated to advancing civil society and improving individual and community health and well-being. After he retired from the Bureau in 1982, he remained dedicated to the field by supporting its next generation of leaders. He became director of the intern program of Worcester State College and a consultant and guest lecturer at numerous colleges and universities (Prabook). Cooper died in 1999, leaving a legacy worth learning about and from—and studying further—as a chapter in the overlapping histories of mass communication, popular television, education, and public health.