C4 education facing 10% cut

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Channel 4 will cut its education budget by 10% next year as part of its latest round of cuts.

Next year the department will have around £600,000 less to spend, but hopes to secure funding from third parties on co-productions. The first of these is likely to be a game in development with the Wellcome Trust, due to be launched early in the new year.

"We'll be able to do the same and more," said C4 head of education Janey Walker. "Lots of people are trying to find ways to get education to teenagers on different platforms and we're quite ahead of the game."

Last year, the broadcaster moved the bulk of its £6m education budget online. Web spend is put through the budget as commissions are made rather than on transmission, as happens in TV, enabling C4 to ringfence the money upfront.

C4 unveiled its autumn education schedule today, which has a strong focus on sex education and relationships and an emphasis on teenagers sharing advice and experiences with their peers.

• Click here to read more on C4's autumn education schedule

Head of education Janey Walker said scheduling of the TV part of the cross-platform commissions remained problematic, with the target audience underserved by mid-morning weekday broadcasts when most were in school or college.

Opportunities could open to repeat educational programmes at weekends, where C4 plans to scale back daytime commissions.

However, Walker said this would only apply to the more commercially appealing end of the educational spectrum, such as the blog and video diary-led project Year Dot and Lifeproof, in which teenagers ask friends to solve a big emotional dilemma.

Animated sex education show KNTV Sex, which risks drawing complaints from parents with younger children than the 14-to 16-year-olds it targets coming across it in a 9.30am slot, will not get a weekend repeat.