Sunrise Semester

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Overview

Sunrise Semester was an American television series which aired on CBS from 1957 through 1982. It was produced in conjunction with New York University. During the months of June, July and August, the program was known as Summer Semester. The program was so named because it was broadcast at 6:00 or 6:30 a.m., depending on the area. Sunrise Semester was one of the first examples of distance learning, telecourses, or MOOCs. Lecturers presented NYU credit courses in studio on a wide range of academic subjects, and these broadcast courses were offered for credit to anyone who paid the course fees. The teachers were chosen from the NYU faculty, and included Neil Postman, who taught a course in 1976. The show ran on the CBS schedule for almost 25 years, but by the early 1980s, declining ratings, the rise of public television in the US, and CBS' desire to schedule more news-oriented programming in the morning hours, all led to the program's cancellation.