Video: The Battle over Classroom TV

Two newscasts, one with ads and one without, aim for teens

The beleaguered high school teacher played by Glenn Ford in Blackboard Jungle finally got through to his unruly inner-city class by showing them a movie. "What's the answer -- visual education?" marveled a fellow teacher after the breakthrough session. "Partly," Ford replied. "If you can just get them stimulated . . ."

Times have changed. Today the issue is not whether visual education (via flickering projector or state-of-the-art VCR) can stimulate students. The question is who should do the stimulating, and at what cost. With the debut of a controversial newscast for teenagers, a fierce battle has been joined over TV...

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