Kids' Television in Ethiopia

Shane Etzenhouser is a midwesterner who is now living in Ethiopia and producing the country's first and only children's show, Tsehai Loves Learning, with his wife. I met Shane in July at the Little Airplane Academy in New York City and was able to watch a segment of the program; it was simple, elegant, and, in an episode dealing with a parents' death from AIDS, touching. The show had just won the Prix Jeunesse International Next Generation Prize in Munich, and I was able to see it courtesy of David Kleeman, who had brought along a sampling of programs from that event.

So I was pleased to learn last week that Shane had won the prestigious Japan Prize 2008 International Contest for Educational Media. I therefore planned to write a nice long entry about the show this week, but Josh Selig beat me to it. Last Saturday he posted an interview with Shane at his blog Planet Preschool, which is well worth the reading.