Seminar to showcase successful educational TV in Ireland and explore new opportunities for collaboration

As part of National Adult Literacy Awareness Week (22 – 26 September) the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI), the National Adult Literacy Agency (NALA) and the Irish Film Institute (IFI) will present a seminar entitled: Education through television: learning from the story of adult literacy. It will be held in the IFI, Dublin on Wednesday 24 September, at 10.30 am.

The aim of this seminar is to show organisations with an educational remit how they can exploit the medium of television to both educate and inform people, or to raise awareness of an issue.

The seminar will showcase some of the educational TV programming produced by NALA and the BAI over the last few years, hear the experience of programme producers and participants and explore new opportunities for collaboration.

The seminar will be of particular interest to organisations such as education providers, state agencies and charities, who want to educate or increase awareness of an issue. It will also be an opportunity for TV producers and companies to learn more about educational TV programming in Ireland, meet these organisations and learn how the BAI funds these types of initiatives.

Speaking about the seminar, Inez Bailey, Director of NALA said:

“Since 2000, the National Adult Literacy Agency has been using the mass medium of television to highlight literacy issues, outline supports that are available and motivate people to return to education.  In total, we have been involved in 14 TV series.  These have helped us gradually remove the stigma of having a literacy difficulty and they have encouraged thousands of people to ring our freephone support line for help. It has been a hugely successful medium for us and we hope that this seminar will show other organisations how they too can use it to reach and teach more people. We would encourage any organisation to come along on the day to hear how you can use TV to achieve your organisation’s goals.”

“Speaking about the BAI’s involvement with the event, Sound and Vision Scheme Director Ciarán Kissane said: “The BAI has supported a range of innovative, educational radio and television projects using licence fee funding over the last 10 years. Many of these have had a literacy focus and the Authority is delighted to partner with NALA and the IFI to showcase these projects and to explore the further development of educational programming for Irish audiences.  As part of this year’s Sound & Vision funding rounds, the BAI has allocated €1m to a dedicated education and animation round.  The BAI looks forward to receiving applications in advance of the closing date on October 2.”

This event is free.

Tickets are available through the IFI. Simply book your FREE seat in person at the IFI Box Office, by contacting us on 01 679 3477 or emailing boxoffice@irishfilm.ie (please note that your emailed booking requests must be confirmed by reply email from the Box Office in order to be considered valid).