PBS

==Member stations==
{{main|List of PBS member stations}}

{{As of|March 2015}}, PBS maintains current memberships with 354 television stations encompassing 50 states, the District of Columbia and four U.S. possessions;<ref name="Station Index" /><ref>{{cite web |title=Stations for Network - PBS |url=http://www.rabbitears.info/search.php?request=network_search&network=PBS |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110817201438/http://www.rabbitears.info/search.php?request=network_search&network=PBS |archive-date=17 August 2011 |access-date=March 12, 2015 |work=RabbitEars.info}}</ref> as such, it is the only television broadcaster in the United States—commercial or non-commercial—which has station partners licensed in every U.S. state (by comparison, none of the five major commercial broadcast networks has affiliates in certain states where PBS has members, most notably [[New Jersey]]). The service has an estimated national reach of 93.74% of all households in the United States (or 292,926,047 Americans with at least one television set).

PBS stations are commonly operated by [[nonprofit organization]]s, state agencies, local authorities (such as municipal boards of education), or [[university|universities]] in their [[city of license]]; this is similar (albeit more centralized in states where a licensee owns multiple stations rebroadcasting the main PBS member) to the early model of commercial broadcasting in the U.S., in which network-affiliated stations were initially owned by companies that owned few to no other television stations elsewhere in the country. In some U.S. states, a group of PBS stations throughout the entire state may be organized into a single regional "subnetwork" (such as [[Alabama Public Television]] and [[Arkansas PBS]]); in this model, PBS programming and other content is distributed by the originating station in the subnetwork to other [[broadcast relay station|full-power stations that serve as satellites as well as any low-power translators]] in other areas of the state. Some states may be served by such a regional network and simultaneously have PBS member stations in a certain city (such as the case with secondary member [[KBDI-TV]] in [[Denver]], which is not related to [[Colorado]] member network [[Rocky Mountain PBS]] and its [[flagship (broadcasting)|flagship station]] and primary Denver PBS member, KRMA-TV) that operate autonomously from the regional member network.

As opposed to the present commercial broadcasting model in which network programs are often carried exclusively on one television station in a given market, PBS may maintain more than one member station in certain markets, which may be owned by the licensee of the market's primary PBS member station or owned by a separate licensee (as a prime example, [[KOCE-TV]], [[KLCS]] and [[KVCR-DT]]—which are all individually owned—serve as PBS stations for the Los Angeles [[media market|market]]; KCET served as the market's primary PBS member until it left the service in January 2011,<ref>{{cite news |title=KOCE takes over as top PBS station after KCET cuts ties with network |url=http://pedrowatcher.ocregister.com/2010/10/08/koce-takes-over-as-top-pbs-station-after-kcet-cuts-ties-with-network/28174/ |author=Peter Larsen |newspaper=[[Orange County Register]] |publisher=[[Freedom Communications]] |date=October 8, 2010 |access-date=March 12, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101010023551/http://pedrowatcher.ocregister.com/2010/10/08/koce-takes-over-as-top-pbs-station-after-kcet-cuts-ties-with-network/28174/ |archive-date=October 10, 2010 |url-status=dead}}</ref> at which time it was replaced by KOCE). KCET rejoined PBS in 2019, thus giving the Los Angeles area four different member stations.

For these cases, PBS utilizes the Program Differentiation Plan, which divides by percentage the number of programs distributed by the service that each member can carry on their schedule; often, this assigns a larger proportion of PBS-distributed programming to the primary member station, with the secondary members being allowed to carry a lesser number of program offerings from the service's schedule. Unlike public broadcasters in most other countries, PBS cannot own any of the stations that broadcasts its programming; therefore, it is one of the few television programming bodies that does not have any [[owned-and-operated station]]s. This is partly due to the origins of the PBS stations themselves, and partly due to historical [[broadcast license]] issues.

===Participating stations===

Most PBS member stations have produced at least some nationally distributed programs. Current regularly scheduled programming on the [[PBS Satellite Service|PBS national feed]] is produced by a smaller group of stations, including:
* [[WGBH-TV]] (''[[Arthur (TV series)|Arthur]]'', ''[[Nova (American TV series)|NOVA]]'', ''[[Masterpiece (TV series)|Masterpiece]]'', ''[[Frontline (U.S. TV series)|Frontline]]'', ''[[Martha Speaks (TV series)|Martha Speaks]]'', ''[[Peep and the Big Wide World]]'', ''[[Curious George (TV series)|Curious George]]'', ''[[Lidia's Kitchen]]'', ''[[Design Squad]]'', ''[[Jamie Oliver]]'', etc.)
* [[WNET]] (''[[Nature (TV series)|Nature]]'', ''[[PBS NewsHour|PBS NewsHour Weekend]]'', ''[[Cyberchase]]'', ''[[Amanpour & Company]]'', ''[[Wishbone (TV Series)|Wishbone]]'' etc.)
** Previously [[Connecticut Public Television]] and now WNET (''[[Barney & Friends]]'', ''[[Bob the Builder]]'', ''[[Thomas & Friends]]'', etc.)
* [[WETA-TV]] (''[[PBS NewsHour]]'', ''[[Washington Week]]'', ''[[A Capitol Fourth]] (annually)'', ''[[America's Test Kitchen]]'', ''[[This Old House]]'', ''[[Pati Jinich|Pati's Mexican Table]]'', ''[[BBC World News]]'', etc.)
* [[WTTW]] (''[[Nature Cat]]'', ''[[WordWorld]]'', ''[[Kidsongs]]'')
* [[Maryland Public Television]] (''[[MotorWeek]]'', ''[[Space Racers]]'', ''[[Wimzie's House]]'', ''[[Zoboomafoo]]'', ''[[Julia Child]]'')
* [[KLRU]] (''[[Austin City Limits]]'')
* [[KCET]] (''[[Sid the Science Kid]]'', ''[[Lost L.A.]]'')
* [[KQED (TV)|KQED]] (''[[The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That!]]'', ''[[Yan Can Cook|Yan Can Cook: Spice Kingdom]]'')
* [[Oregon Public Broadcasting]] (''[[History Detectives]]'', ''[[Rick Steves' Europe]]'' (season 10))
* [[PBS North Carolina]] (''[[The Woodwright's Shop]]'')
* [[South Carolina ETV]] (''[[Studio See]]'', ''[[The Magic School Bus (TV series)|The Magic School Bus]]'', ''[[A Chef's Life]]'')
* [[WXXI-TV]] (''[[Biz Kid$]]'')
* [[WQED (TV)|WQED]] (''[[Mister Rogers' Neighborhood]]'') 
* [[Twin Cities PBS]] (KTCA-TV/KTCI-TV) (''[[Newton's Apple]]'', ''[[DragonflyTV]]'', ''[[SciGirls]]'', ''[[Hero Elementary]]'')
* [[KCTS-TV]] (''[[Rick Steves' Europe]]'')
* [[Arkansas PBS]] (''[[State of the Art]]'')
* [[WYES-TV]] (''[[Kevin Belton]]'')