The study aims to develop knowledge on how FM radios (private) are promoting socialrndevelopment issues to improve the publicâ€™s welfare. The study uses development media theoryrnand social responsibility theory to explain the responsibility that the private broadcasters have inrntreating educational and socially relevant themes (pro social messages).rnThe empirical data was collected through four focus group discussions (with a total of 22 FMrnradio listeners) and individual interviews (which are entirely qualitative) with two radio editorsrnand two reporters. The Focus Group Discussion (FDG) and individual interviews werernconducted from May10 to May 15, 2010. The FDG was conducted with FM radio listeners inrnAsko (Kolfe Karaneo sub city) and Shiromeda (Gulalle sub city) of Addis Ababa.rnThis study treated the types of educational development programs that the FM radios broadcast,rnaudiencesâ€™ perception to the private FM radios contribution to social development and therneditors and reporters view of the radios role in enhancing educational development messages.rnAccordingly, the findings of this study show that the private FM radios have created programsrnthat are entertaining, educational, socially responsible and commercially profitable. The FMrnradio stations devote a reasonable percentage of their broadcasting time to the discussion ofrnpublic issues of interest i.e. educational and socially relevant issues.rnThe radio stations have been reflecting and promoting local identity, character and culture byrnfocusing on local content. They are also assisting the dissemination of expert and socialrnknowledge on topics of interest to general listeners as well as NGOs and other institutionsrnengaged in social transformation in Ethiopia. These FM radio stations have been successful inrnbringing educational development issues in to public deliberations.rnThe study also found that the FM radio stations produce radio programs jointly with developmentrnpartners who work on development and broadcast a variety of educational development themesrnover the last two years. The educational development themes that the FM radio stationsrnbroadcast include culture (language and literature, music and poetry) and environmental issues,rnhealth education, family planning, gender issues, science and technology, rights of the disabled,rnmarriage and family values. These various educational development themes are beingrndisseminated through many popular program formats such as talk shows, chat shows,rncommentaries, magazine formats, drama and music.rnNow listeners give feedback and participate in the production of these programs through variousrnchannels and these have included phone calls, text messaging, email messages and personalrnvisits.rnThe interpretation and analysis as well as the conclusions of this study are based on the theoriesrnof development advanced by development communication scholars as treated in chapter two ofrnthis paper.