FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
February 1st, 2013
CONTACTS:
WQED
George Hazimanolis
412-622-1366
ghaziman@wqed.org
SLB
Larry Berger
412-586-6300 x1
larry@slbradio.org
JLP
Christina Kepplinger Johansen
412-488-9270
president@jlpgh.org
WQED and SLB RADIO PRODUCTIONS, INC. LAUNCH
COMMERCIAL-FREE KIDS RADIO
Free online radio service for children and families launches
PITTSBURGH—Something’s in the air… iQ Kids Radio can now be heard every
Saturday at www.iqkidsradio.org with engaging programming for children and
families. Launched in January and developed as a collaboration between WQED and
SLB Radio Productions, Inc. (SLB), iQ Kids Radio is designed to meet the need for an
all-education, trusted radio service for children and families, iQ Kids Radio is a
family-friendly commercial-free streaming radio service that provides a safe,
entertaining, and fun way to learn, listen, laugh and much more. The service is free
during the pilot phase of the project. It can be heard from Midnight Friday to
Midnight EST every Saturday.
Grounded in more than 75 years of combined experience in delivering high-quality
public radio and television to our region and beyond, this new, innovative service
leverages the assets of WQED, PBS, SLB, and the popular Saturday Light Brigade
radio show to serve families with children 10 and under.
Seed funding for iQ Kids Radio is provided by The Junior League of Pittsburgh,
Inc., a founding partner. Additional support is provided by The Grable Foundation
and the James McCandless Charitable Trust.
Listening is easy by simply clicking visiting www.iQkidsradio.org or by using the
free TuneIn Radio App available for Android and iOS smartphones and tablets. The
TuneIn app can be accessed and, if necessary, installed at tinyurl.com/iqkidsradio-tunein.
You can also connect through social media on Twitter @iqkidsradio or
www.facebook.com/iQKidsRadio.
Want to be on iQ Kids Radio?
Call 855-323-KIDS (5427) and leave us a message about how to make a yummy recipe,
where you are traveling this spring, a wish for the new year, or sing us your favorite song.
You may also email us at wehearyou@iqkidsradio.org with your feedback!
Additional information
iQ Kids Radio currently operates as a Saturday-only streaming service with original
programming running for 24 hours from midnight Friday night to midnight
Saturday night. The current programming lineup includes the following (all times
are Eastern):
Sweet Dreams – Midnight to 6am
Classical music for kids and adults soothe the soul for a dreamy night.
The Saturday Light Brigade – 6am to Noon
The region’s national award-winning radio program for kids, adults and everyone in
between.
Music & Family Fun – Noon – 4pm
From worldly grooves to swinging sing-a-longs, afternoons rock on iQ Kids Radio.
Let’s Learn – 4pm to 8pm
A program full of songs and stories of science, math, and the wondrous world
around us.
DJ Daddy Dance Party – 8pm to 9pm
For parents and babysitters – a packed hour of dance until you’re on the floor party until it’s bedtime music.
Bedtime Stories – 9pm to 10pm
The calming effect of a great story as the kids wind down for the night.
Night Night – 10pm to Midnight
A combination of soft lullabies and classic stories.
Children, families and caregivers can sign up now at www.iQkidsradio.org to receive
information about iQ Kids Radio or submit ideas and music. The site also includes a
section where kids and parents can submit programming suggestions.
The need for iQ Kids Radio
Multimedia and technology are changing daily. Youth ages 8-18 use media—
television, music players, computers, and video games—for nearly eleven hours
each day, and kids under age eight spend eight hours with multimedia each day. We
know that media shapes children’s cultural beliefs and norms in powerful ways.
While there are numerous media offerings “for children” across various media
platforms, very few adopt high-quality educational standards.
The concept of iQ Kids Radio
iQ Kids Radio blends age-appropriate content from multiple disciplines---language,
science, music appreciation, geography, and more—into a 24/7 streaming audio
format currently providing original content as a Saturday-only service. As the
service develops, iQ Kids Radio will also explore offering individual programs for
on-demand listening, podcast and national distribution. Such programs may focus
on storytelling, language lessons, music from diverse genres and music listening
tips, children's literature, food chemistry, and other subjects that strengthen
academic achievement, sharpen core life skills, and engage children and adults
together. Programming also will include youth-created music, storytelling and
news/commentary based on listener submissions and SLB’s work with more than
8,000 children annually.
The Junior League of Pittsburgh (JLP), a founding partner, selected iQ Kids Radio as
its three-year signature project. Through this award, the JLP will provide
administrative and volunteer support to launch iQ Kids Radio as well as financial
support totaling $45,000. JLP members will focus on two areas of iQ Kids Radio:
business strategy and event planning. Additionally, JLP members will design and
implement signature events that will be critical to the project’s growth. At the
conclusion of its three-year partnership, iQ Kids Radio will be poised to be selfsufficient and prepared to expand its capacity as an innovative resource, created in
Pittsburgh, to support families and children around the country.
For more information about iQ Kids Radio, please visit www.iQkidsradio.org.
Photographs are available for download from WQED’s pressroom at www.wqed.org/pressroom.
WQED Multimedia www.wqed.org
The people of WQED Multimedia produce, create and distribute quality content and
services to engage, inform, educate, and entertain the public within their community
and around the world. WQED was the nation’s first community-supported
television station and went on the air on April 1, 1954.
The WQED Education Department has an illustrious history of service and
innovation to local and national students, families, educators, and care providers.
Today, WQED’s Education Department helps provide effective lifelong learning to
the entire region. WQED’s new six-year strategy, iQ: smartmedia, launched in
September of 2010 and has been aggressively aiming for its goal – to transform the
way media is used for education – ever since.
With a lineup that attracts children from toddlers to teens, WQED is an essential part
of every childhood. WQED commits 12 hours of every weekday schedule to high
quality children's programming parents can count on. In addition, WQED offers
connections to PBS KIDS, PBS Teachers and PBS Parents through its website,
wqed.org. WQED has enriched the lives of children with their own productions as
well as the educationally robust and entertaining lineup of PBS KIDS’s programming on subjects as diverse as global thinking, reading, and science. WQED was also the
home of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, produced by Family Communications, Inc.
(now the fred Rogers Company) for more than 40 years. More information is
available at www.wqed.org/education.
SLB Radio Productions, Inc.
A nonprofit with twelve employees, SLB began pursuing its mission in 1978 with
The Saturday Light Brigade, a Saturday morning public radio program that blends
acoustic music, live performances by youth and adults, participatory puzzles, on-air
telephone calls, and interviews with other community-based nonprofits serving
youth and families. Programming grew substantially between 1990 and 2000, as
SLB built a strong and loyal audience, winning 10 local, state and national awards. In
2004, with support from the broadcast industry, foundations, corporations and
individual donors, SLB opened a $250,000 broadcast studio and training complex in
the expanded Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh. SLB has since emerged as a hub of community and educational activity. Its work today focuses on (1) continued
production of The Saturday Light Brigade radio program and its extension as a
vehicle to promote youth voice and (2) school and in-studio workshops in which
experienced radio broadcasters and sound engineers work with children to explore
self-expression as well as the tools used to collect and process audio into a creative
work. More information about SLB is available at www.slbradio.org and
www.neighborhoodvoices.org.
Junior League of Pittsburgh, Inc.
The Junior League of Pittsburgh educates and trains its members to provide effective
volunteer service, to research challenging community needs, and to initiate pilot projects or
expand services to meet those needs. Nearly 400 League women volunteer 10,000 hours
annually in the Pittsburgh community. The organization provides administrative, financial,
and volunteer support for projects and facilitates the permanent sponsorship of programs
by other community organizations. Over the past ten years, the League has contributed over
$500,000 in community donations and grants.
The League has a 90-plus-year history of high profile community projects. These include the
Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, Transplant Recipients International Organization (TRIO), Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation, The Caring Place, and others. Today, the
League remains an innovator with a focus on creating opportunities that enhance children’s well-being and inspire their curiosity.
In 2012, the League selected iQ Kids Radio as a signature project. As a founding partner, the
League will contribute $45,000 in seed funding and 7,500 hours of administrative and
volunteer support over the next three years. The League’s trained volunteers will design and help implement new outreach, promotional, and business strategies aimed at sustaining
iQ Kids Radio. The League first supported WQED at its inception on air in 1954 by creating
children’s television programming for ten years.
Additional Junior League of Pittsburgh information is available at www.jlpgh.org.
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