Sesame Workshop

Sesame Workshop (SW), originally known as the Children's Television Workshop (CTW), is an American nonprofit organization that has been responsible for the production of several educational children's programs—including its first and best-known, Sesame Street—that have been televised internationally. Television producer Joan Ganz Cooney and foundation executive Lloyd Morrisett developed the idea to form an organization to produce Sesame Street, a television series which would help children, especially those from low-income families, prepare for school. They spent two years, from 1966 to 1968, researching, developing, and raising money for the new series. Cooney was named as the Workshop's first executive director, which was termed "one of the most important television developments of the decade."

Sesame Street premiered as a series on National Educational Television (NET) in the United States on November 10, 1969, and moved to NET's successor, the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), in late 1970. The Workshop was formally incorporated in 1970. Gerald S. Lesser and Edward L. Palmer were hired to perform research for the series; they were responsible for developing a system of planning, production, and evaluation, and the interaction between television producers and educators, later termed the "CTW model". They also hired a staff of producers and writers. After the initial success of Sesame Street, they began to plan for its continued survival, which included procuring additional sources of funding and creating other television series. The early 1980s were a challenging period for the Workshop; difficulty finding audiences for their other productions and a series of bad investments harmed the organization until licensing agreements stabilized its revenues by 1985.

After Sesame Street 's initial success, the CTW began to think about its survival beyond the development and first season of the show, since their funding sources were composed of organizations and institutions that tended to start projects, not sustain them. Government funding ended by 1981, so the CTW developed other activities, including unsuccessful ventures into adult programs, the publications of books and music, international co-productions, interactive media and new technologies, licensing arrangements, and programs for preschools. By 2005, income from the organization's international co-productions of the series was $96 million. By 2008, the Sesame Street Muppets accounted for $15–17 million per year in licensing and merchandising fees. Cooney resigned as CEO in 1990; David Britt was named as her replacement.

On June 5, 2000, the CTW changed its name to Sesame Workshop to better represent its activities beyond television, and Gary Knell became CEO. H. Melvin Ming replaced Knell in 2011. In 2014, Ming was succeeded by Jeffrey D. Dunn.

Productions

 * Sesame Street (1969-present)
 * The Electric Company (1971-1977)
 * Feeling Good (1974-1975)
 * The Best of Families (1977)
 * 3-2-1 Contact (1980-1988)
 * Square One Television (1987-1992)
 * Encyclopedia (1988)
 * Sign On! (1991-2006)
 * Ghostwriter (1992-1995) (co-production with BBC Television (Seasons 1 & 2 only))
 * Cro (1993-1994) (co-production with Film Roman)
 * Greeny Phatom (1995-present) (co-production with 20th Century Fox Television and Disney Television Studios)
 * Big Bag (1996-1998)
 * Dr. Beanson (1996-2000) (co-production with 20th Century Fox Television)
 * The New Ghostwriter Mysteries (1997) (co-production with Decode Entertainment)
 * Dragon Tales (1999-2005) (co-production with Adelaide Productions, Columbia TriStar Television and Sony Pictures Television)
 * Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat (2001-2002) (co-production with CinéGroupe)
 * Sponk! (2001-2002) (co-production with Noggin LLC and Insight Productions)
 * Tiny Planets (2001-2002) (co-production with Pepper's Ghost Productions Ltd.)
 * Dr. PBS (2001-2003) (co-production with 20th Century Fox Television)
 * Play with Me Sesame (2002-2007) (co-production with Nickelodeon Digital, Nickelodeon Animation Studios and Noggin LLC)
 * Out There (2003 TV series) (2003-2004) (co-production with Noggin LLC)
 * Pinky Dinky Doo (2005-2010) (co-production with Cartoon Pizza, Abrams Gentile Entertainment and Keyframe Digital Productions)
 * The Upside Down Show (2006) (co-production with Blink Films, Noggin LLC and Nickelodeon Australia)
 * Panwapa (2008-2009) (co-production with The Merrill Lynch Foundation)
 * The Electric Company (2009 TV series) (2009-2011)
 * Esme & Roy (2018-present) (co-production with Nelvana)
 * Helpsters (2019-present) (co-production with Big Indie Pictures and Monkey Boys Productions)
 * Ghostwriter (2019 TV series) (2019-present) (co-production with Sinking Ship Entertainment)
 * Helpsters: Help You (2020-present) (co-production with Big Indie Pictures and Monkey Boys Productions)
 * Bea's Block (2021-present)