Eureka Learning Channel, also known as Eureka, was a Singaporean cable television channel owned by Singapore CableVision and available on its own network. It was Singapore's first homegrown children's channel with a strong emphasis on educational content, the vast majority of which came from overseas. The channel operated between 2 September 1996 and 31 March 2002.
Portions of the schedule were also carried for free on the SCV Preview Channel. As of year-end 1999, Eureka was available to 20% of Singaporean households.[1]
Ahead of the launch of Eureka, a programme produced by the National University of Singapore, Preparing for Higher Education, was broadcast on the SCV cable network. This was one of twelve local programmes to be shown on the channel, which was scheduled to open on 2 September 1996. The target audience was from preschoolers (aged 3 at earliest) to young adults in their early twenties.[2] Upon launching on the scheduled date, the channel broadcast 15 hours a day, from 7am to 10pm. The bulk of the output was given to kids and young adults, while from 9pm to 10pm, the channel had an hour devoted to adult education. The channel was launched by Aline Wong and its local programmes were made in collaboration with the Curriculum Development Institute of Singapore, the Ministry of Health and Singapore's two universities.[3] Children's programming was divided between four key demographics, pre-schoolers (3–6), pupils (6–12), teens (12–17) and young adults (17–22). The content differed between demographics: pre-school programming was about language and numbers, while young adult programming was driven mainly on subjects such as sports, music, careers and social issues. Adult education programming tackled leadership and accounting in an initial phase. The channel also had plans to expand beyond Singapore and the region.[4]
In its early years, Eureka was carried on channel 6.