Sesame Workshop (SW), formerly the Children's Television Workshop (CTW), is an American nonprofit organization which 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.
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.
On June 5, 2000, the CTW changed its name to Sesame Workshop to better represent its activities beyond television. Along with HiT Entertainment, PBS, and Comcast, Sesame Workshop is one of the four founders of PBS KIDS Sprout. It currently distributes a majority of Sprout's programming such as Sesame Street, Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat, Dragon Tales and dozens more. The company has had a major part in Sprout's programming since the network's launch in 2005 until it left the channel in 2012.
History with Sprout
2005-2015
Then-CEO of Sesame Workshop, Gary Knell, was instrumental in the creation of PBS KIDS Sprout, which launched in 2005 as a partnership between the Workshop, Comcast, PBS, and HIT Entertainment, all of whom contributed programming to the new network. Sesame Workshop was responsible for programming such as Play With Me Sesame, Dragon Tales, and of course, Sesame Street. After seven years as a partner, in 2012, Sesame Workshop divested its stake in Sprout to NBCUniversal, which in turn later acquired Apax and PBS's shares in the network on March 19, 2013 and November 13, 2013 respectively, thus giving Comcast full ownership. On Sprout's 10th anniversary on September 26, 2015, the network received a brand refresh and shifted focus towards original shows, and phased out older acquired shows due to the network's licenses for these shows expiring. For unknown reasons, Sesame Street continued to air on the network until November 17, 2015, until the other shows, which were removed on September 26.
2015-present
Play With Me Sesame continued to air on the network until July 26, 2015. Sesame Workshop continued to have a presence on Sprout with their show The Furchester Hotel, but that show was removed from the lineup on March 2, 2019.