KET Star Channels KET's Star Channels, the network's interactive distance learning services that were launched in late 1988, predated the advent of digital over-the-air television broadcasting of any kind by eleven years, and they were only available to schools, colleges, universities, and libraries throughout the state through satellite technology. Public schools were outfitted with satellite dishes and keypads, provided by
NTN Communications, to provide two-way communications between the instructors at the KET studios in Lexington and students throughout the state; all public schools in Kentucky were outfitted with the technology by the end of 1989. This interactive service was inspired by a football player predictor game at a local sports bar in Lexington. The services were so successful in education centers, that the network earned the Innovations Award from the Ford Foundation for the star channels in 1991.
KET ITV satellite service Shortly after the successful launch of the interactive Star Channels, in January 1989, KET expanded its instructional programming schedule, which had aired during school hours on the over-the-air KET network since its 1968 inception, to full-time services by launching a pair of closed-circuit
satellite television instructional television services available
free-to-air satellite systems made exclusively for use in education centers, one for elementary schools, and the other for middle and high schools. All schools in Kentucky were equipped with this technology by early 1990. Plans to launch these
instructional television fixed services (ITFS) date back to the 1980s, when the network's over-the-air schedule was overly saturated with instructional programming, which led to the idea to launch the services and eventually, the interactive Star Channels after having conducted a study on how to expand its instructional television offerings. This, along with the 1981 inception of
KET Etc, a cable-only service that was the first attempt to start a second broadcast service, helped the network to combat the overflow of programming on its primary network. A 1986
Lexington Herald-Leader interview with network founder and then-executive director O. Leonard Press revealed the plans to launch this satellite-based service. Star Channel 703 provided PK-12 educational programming exclusively to public schools and libraries throughout the state, plus several other states. Star Channel 704 provided
Annenberg/CPB Project programming, including college-credit telecourses and professional development series.
As KET3 In early 2002, the statewide relaunch of KET2 through the facilities of
WKMJ-TV (channel 68) in Louisville, along with two new digital services,
KET3 and
KET4, were launched over the air as multicast services that were made available through the digital signals of all fifteen principal KET satellites. Initially, KET3 began broadcasting as a locally programmed 24/7
PBS Kids channel programmed by KET, while KET4 began as a PBS digital sampler channel. KET's second, third, and fourth subchannels, which were launched in May 2002, were the first ever digital subchannels in most, if not all, of Kentucky's primary media markets (e.g.
Paducah,
Evansville,
Bowling Green, Louisville,
Cincinnati, Lexington, and
Huntington markets), as most commercial outlets typically never began to launch digital signals or multicast services until the mid- to late-2000s. On September 2, 2002, KET3 and KET4 were repurposed to become over-the-air digital relaunches of Star Channels 703 and 704 as both the then-new third and fourth subchannels began simulcasting the two respective channels, making them available to tens of thousands of homes via the digital over-the-air signals and on
cable television systems for the first time. This has provided a benefit to parents of
home-schooled children, and teachers at
parochial schools (i.e.
Christian and
Catholic schools) in addition to teachers and students of public schools, as well as KET viewers that watch lifelong learning-oriented programming on a regular basis. In addition, KET4 also carried
PBS HD programming during primetime hours. Sometime following that conversion, cable companies within the state began adding those digital channels to their channel lineups. The satellite-based services were discontinued on June 30, 2005, therefore making the instructional programming and Annenberg Channel programming exclusively available through KET3 and KET4, respectively.
Temporary KET-ED simulcast From August until the end of December 2007, the network's subchannels went through a major realignment phase. Beginning in August 2007, the KET3 and KET4 services were merged to create the Education Channel,
KET ED. KET ED and the PBS HD programming block were simulcast on both the DT3 and DT4 subchannels of all 15 of the network's primary transmitters for the remainder of that year.
Birth of The Kentucky Channel On January 1, 2008, the third subchannel of KET's 15 transmitters began airing a new programming format: a then-new channel devoted to programming about Kentucky people, places, and/or events, in a schedule format similar to that of
Twin Cities PBS’s
Minnesota Channel. Beginning on January 1, 2008, KET3 was re-branded as the
Kentucky Channel, or as identified by the network's voiceover announcer,
The Kentucky Channel from KET. Beginning with the debut of the then-new Kentucky Channel, approximately 20 hours of Kentucky-related programming was broadcast on the service. Outside of the 20 hours, the service aired the KET HD evening programming service (national
PBS HD schedule) in primetime hours from 8 p.m. to 12 Midnight
Eastern time (7-11 p.m.
Central time), which was previously aired on KET4 outside of that service's 20 hours of
Annenberg/CPB channel programming, hence the PSIP readers displaying the channel name as KETKYHD during the 2008-09 television season.
As a full-time service Beginning with the 2009–10 television season, the Kentucky Channel expanded to a 24-hour programming schedule after all HD programming schedules began to be handled by the network, and moved onto the flagship service, the main channel of the fifteen principal satellite stations. An increase of fees for the usage of the national PBSHD channel feed caused the network to program PBS HD programming by itself on the main channel. After the KET ED linear service permanently signed off from the DT4 subchannels of KET's principal signals and from WKMJ-DT3, some of its former programming aired overnights on the Kentucky Channel from 1 to 6 a.m. Eastern (12 midnight to 5 a.m. Central) until that block was discontinued in 2012, making the Kentucky Channel truly full-time. KET ED still existed as an
on-demand video service available on the network's website, offering a limited selection of the service's former programming until it was replaced by PBS LearningMedia in the mid-2010s. Also in 2009, the Kentucky Channel began broadcasting over WKMJ-DT2/Louisville; it would move to that station's third subchannel upon WKMJ's conversion to the
ATSC 3.0 (NextGen TV) format in 2022. ==Programming==