28 Feb 2022 Person of the Month: Courtney Pledger

FAMILY:

My experience as a mother is the most rewarding of my life. My children Miranda, Liam, and India have grown into incredible adults and spending time with them and their significant others, whether virtual or in person, is top of my list of priorities. And, I love my extended family in both Arkansas and the United Kingdom.

EDUCATION:

Although I was born in Little Rock, my high school and college years were spent in Jackson, Miss., at Wingfield High School and Millsaps College, where I majored in music and theater. I am most definitely an obsessive, lifelong learner and an enthusiastic student of life!

WORK:

Executive Director and CEO of Arkansas PBS. I have been in my job for five years. Arkansas PBS is a place where creative ideas and innovation are encouraged and flow openly, and with such an incredible team, the years have flown past.

PROFESSIONAL ACCOMPLISHMENTS YOU’RE ESPECIALLY PROUD OF:

Thinking back through my different professional roles, what instantly comes to mind are the people I have had the experience of working closely with, many of whom are still in my life. Nothing happens in creative fields working on one’s own, and it is really hard to top the chance to work with motivated and creative people day in and day out. My New York theater days were a tremendous foundation for me. I’ve enjoyed my roles as a film and television executive and producer. I’m grateful for the opportunity to have led the Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival from 2012 through its 25th year in 2016. And, I couldn’t feel any luckier than I do at this moment to be part of public media in Arkansas and across the country, and to serve my native state in state government.

It would take a lot more than this page to talk about all we have accomplished at Arkansas PBS as a team, so I’ll mention some highlights: The expansion of local storytelling on multiple platforms, as well as Arkansas stories distributed across the country; our groundbreaking education efforts and partnership with the Arkansas Department of Education giving students and educators strong tools like our inventive “Arkansas AMI” when schools closed due to the pandemic, six weeks of learning on the air and online last summer with “Rise and Shine” to address learning loss, our 700+ in-house designed professional development courses used by over 80,000 Arkansas Teachers, and our intentional move into local children’s programming with “Blueberry’s Clubhouse” and an upcoming live-action series for Kindergarten through second grade; AR PBS Sports as the statewide broadcast home of high school sports state finals; the game-changing expansion of our broadcast signal reaching to over 95% of Arkansans moving from six towers to 11; unprecedented transparency in state government and civics education through the Arkansas Citizen’s Access Network (AR-CAN); and a growing content effort to support workforce development training (“Be Pro Be Proud,” “Why Apprentice.”)

Why did you choose your field: I chose to pursue a creative life and have had the chance to explore a lot of avenues. I was incredibly lucky to have parents who, early on, were supportive of my love of the arts, and my instincts took me from one exploration to the next. I love what I do. 

WHAT AWARDS/HONORS HAVE YOU RECEIVED: 

Since 2017, Arkansas PBS has had 12 Mid-America Emmy wins, with five in the last year. We are pleased to be winning in the documentary categories for Arkansas stories and this past year, we were proud to be recognized for Overall Excellence in Community Service, reflecting our deep commitment to Arkansas. Our network won five national Public Media Awards, both in 2021 and 2022, including Excellence in Content, Community Outreach, Education, and Marketing. In 2020, our marketing team received two Public Relations Society of America honors, and our team member, Marty Ryall, received the National Advocacy Award from America’s Public Television Stations.

The personal honor that has meant the most to me is the Lillian Gish Producing Award from the Women in Film national organization. Having had the experience of working with Lillian, one of the great silent film legends, in the very early days of my career, receiving the award named in her honor many years later felt somehow like a nod from her long after she was gone. I have also had the honor of producing two Primetime Emmy winning television films and gained an Emmy nomination as a Primetime producer. And, I am thrilled to represent Arkansas PBS on the national PBS Board of Directors and as vice-chair of the National Educational Television Association.

Community activities: Engagement activities and events are at the center of who we are at Arkansas PBS. We are a Corporation for Public Broadcasting Ready to Learn Station to help extend the impact of PBS KIDS in Arkansas communities; we partnered with Sesame Workshop for the Sesame Street in Communities initiative and established the Reading in the Delta outreach project with the support of the Joan R. and Charles M. Taylor II Memorial Endowment Fund. We offer frequent community engagement events across the state tied to Arkansas stories and national PBS content.

MOST CHERISHED POSSESSION:

The round wooden table that commanded my grandmother’s dining room in El Dorado when I was growing up. It has taken on epic proportions in my memory. The stories told at that table and the meals shared by family and friends are part of me.

What do you love about living in the 501: My family on both sides goes back generations in Arkansas and the South. I left for what turned out to be many years, living in New York, California, and London, but I always knew I would come home. And, the fact that Arkansas PBS is headquartered in the 501 and that our statewide efforts are coordinated from here is wonderful.

ANYTHING ELSE YOU WOULD LIKE TO INCLUDE: 

We are surrounded by all types of media in our lives every day. Arkansas PBS stands out as public service media as it educates, entertains, and inspires. We are accessible everywhere our audience is — not only on every platform, but also over-the-air statewide to those without broadband. After five years at the network, each day is filled with more and more ideas on possible content partnerships, additional ways to make a difference for Arkansas audiences, giving us more ways to be at the center of Arkansans’ lives. The possibilities are infinite.