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Denise Blumenthal: Pioneering PBS LearningMedia

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Denise Blumenthal: Pioneering PBS LearningMedia

Introduction to Denise Blumenthal. 5:18 min. Interview: Raymond Elman.  Post-Production: Lee Skye.  Music: Carmen Cicero  Recorded via ZOOM  4/28/2025, Miami — Boston.

 

DENISE BLUMENTHAL was Director of Education at WGBH, Boston’s public television station.  Her work included strategic planning, fundraising and product development.  Under her leadership, WGBH’s Education Department in partnership with PBS launched PBS LearningMedia, an online library with more than 100,000 digital resources used by more than 1.6 million educators. While working at The Regional Educational Lab and The NETWORK, Inc. she managed numerous state and federally funded education programs, wrote curriculum, and trained teachers throughout the country.

Since leaving WGBH, Denise helped a start-up raise funds, reviewed proposals for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, joined the governing board of Boston’s Baldwin Pilot Preschool, wrote a monthly food column, Belly Up Dining, with her husband for cravingboston.wgbh.org. and launched KitchenCoach, where she teaches cooking.

The videos below were recorded via Zoom, are organized by Success Factor, and run between 30 seconds and 5 minutes. Click on any video. You must be connected to the Internet to view the videos.

 

SEIZES OPPORTUNITIES:   2:35 min.

Where did you grow up, and what was your first awareness of art of any discipline?

 

VALUES FIRST-RATE EDUCATION:   2:40 min.

Where did you go to school and what did you learn that still informs you today?

 

SERENDIPITY:   2:23 min.

How did you meet your future husband, Grammy Award winning jazz critic Bob Blumenthal?

 

UNDERSTANDS THE BUSINESS OF ART:   1:10 min.

When you met future Tony Award winning producers Rick Steiner and Rocco Landesman at the University of Wisconsin, did you ever imagine that Rocco would become chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts?

 

PERSEVERANCE FURTHERS:   2:00 min.

Do I remember correctly that Bob grew up in St. Louis and was a jazz afficionado from a very young age?

 

EXPOSURE TO BROAD INFLUENCES:   0:36 sec.

Are you a jazz lover too?

 

SERENDIPITY:   0:48 sec.

It sounds like you moved to Cambridge after college and immediately became part of an interesting community.

 

CRITICAL THINKING:    4:47 min.

What was your path from teaching to Boston’s WGBH, one of the premier PBS stations in the country?

 

PERSEVERANCE FURTHERS:   3:44 min.

How did you get teachers to recognize the value of your packages and use them?

 

CRITICAL THINKING:   0:43 sec.

Did you have to adjust the pacing of your content as student attention spans shrunk over time?

 

COLLABORATION:   0:53 sec.

Did you only work within the confines of WGBH? Or did you collaborate with other PBS stations?

 

CRITICAL THINKING:    0:58 sec.

If you were starting the PBS LearningMedia project in 2025, how would your vision and goals differ?

 

COMMUNITY VALUES:   2:29 min.

Who were some of your role models and influencers?

 

CREATIVE FLEXIBILITY:    0:50 sec.

What’s your favorite movie?