From Jim Metrock:
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt says they inspire curiosity every day. As a major supplier of educational resources, I am sure they inspire millions of students to be more curious daily. However, this month the company itself did a very curious thing: they acquired the pariah of US education – Channel One.
Why would Houghton Mifflin do that? Their company hasn’t been out of bankruptcy that long, and now they are giving educators, school administrators, school board members on the local and state level, parents, and the general public a legitimate reason to question Houghton Mifflin’s commitment to the best interests of students.
By acquiring Channel One, Houghton Mifflin has acquired the history of Channel One. Houghton Mifflin obviously performed a due diligence investigation of Channel One to make sure they knew the company backwards and forwards before making an offer. (All corporate buyers do this.) They looked at the controversies that have swirled around Channel One for decades. They had to have noticed the massive loss of its student audience. They learned, if they didn’t know already, that no educational organization endorses Channel One News’ presence in classrooms. The due diligence team had to have known that Channel One News is outlawed from all public school classrooms in New York, Channel One’s home state. Surely, Houghton Mifflin knew about the resolutions English teachers and Social Studies teachers passed against Channel One. HMH knew that all of this bad news was due to Channel One’s advertising.
Yet knowing all of this, or at least some of this, Houghton Mifflin’s executives enthusiastically said, “Yes! We want this company to be a part of us!” They liked what they saw so much that they bought the company. As for Obligation, Inc., from now on it’s “Houghton Mifflin/Channel One News.” Houghton Mifflin is now THE company that brings commercials into American classrooms. Houghton Mifflin bought ALL of Channel One, not just their digital content.
Will the new owner surprise the education world by removing advertising in all its forms from Channel One News? That would make common sense, but that prospect isn’t looking good. If Houghton Mifflin thought classroom commercials were a bad thing, they would have ended them on May 13, 2014 the day they bought Channel One.
But they didn’t.
Ending all Channel One advertising could make Houghton Mifflin a hero in the education world, a hero among parents. A new Channel One, shed of all the advertising controversies would be able to focus solely on making excellent digital content for its new owner.
Yet, it doesn’t look like common sense will win the day.
Curiouser and curiouser.
