WBGU-PBS has received a national honor for reaching out beyond the television screen to assist the
community.
The Bowling Green State University public television station received a My Source Community Impact Awards
for Engagement from the Corporation of Public Broadcasting for two initiatives – one to heighten
awareness of cancer and the other to help people facing home foreclosures. The station was one of 26
nationwide to receive the honor.
Patrick Fitzgerald, the station manager, said that "There’s No Place Like Home" got started
when Neil McCabe, the executive director of WSOS Community Action, showed up in his office and asked:
"What are we going to do about this?"
Ohio is among the top three states in the number of foreclosures.
The result was a two-hour special report "NW Ohio Journal Special Report: Mortgage Foreclosure
Intervention." The show brought together a panel of experts from banking, state government, law and
social service agencies. It presented viewers with resources about how to avoid foreclosure as well as
how to deal with it. More than 500 copies of a DVD of the program were then distributed.
"Building a Legacy of Hope" was prompted by members of the station’s advisory council who urged
it to "dream bigger" when it had the opportunity in 2007 to apply for a cancer outreach grant.

The result was a series of broadcast and community events including two locally produced programs, a Web
site, a community health fair and a culminating event that allowed cancer survivors and their family
members and friends to record their experiences and advice. Those stories were linked on
wbgu.org/legacyofhope.
These projects, Fitzgerald said, are "wonderful examples of what public television does, and what we
do year after year."
These projects, said Mark Erstling, senior vice president for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting,
show "the value of the station to this community."
It’s important, said Erstling, who was in Bowling Green to present the award, for stations to go beyond
the programs they broadcast and reach out to the audience on the other side of the television set.
In an interview after the presentation, Erstling said the honored projects stood out from the more than
100 applications submitted.
All the projects "saw a need in the community and worked within the community" to address it.

This kind of activist role is fitting for public broadcasting, he said, because stations have "the
infrastructure, the way of getting information to the public."
It’s not a matter of public broadcasting "having a place at the table," he said. "We are
the table."
The local project on foreclosures, he said, has inspired a national project.
BGSU President Carol Cartwright said the university as a whole believes in developing partnerships beyond
campus. "It’s in our DNA."
"WBGU has been an important connection between BGSU and our community," she said.
BGSU President Dr. Carol Cartwright, from left, Mark Erstling, CPB, and Pat Fitzgerald, WBGU-PBS General
Manager. 9/2/09 (Photo: J.D. Pooley/Sentinel-Tribune)