Jamie Lynn Spears, the kid sister of Britney Spears, is off to a flying start in her new Nickelodeon series.

Her new comedy, "Zoey 101," notched Nick its biggest "tween" audience in nearly eight years when the show debuted Jan. 9 - and did even better this past Sunday.

"We feel like we have momentum at the moment, particularly with this show, which was highly anticipated and talked-about for a while with our audience," says Nick president Cyma Zarghami.

In the show, Spears - a veteran of Teen Nick's "All That" sketch-comedy series - stars as Zoey Brooks, a 13-year-old free-spirit enrolled at the co-ed Pacific Coast Academy, a boarding school allowing girls for the first time.

The series is shot entirely on-location at Pepperdine University in Malibu.

"We laid a pretty good foundation in 'Teen Nick,' which has been an incredible generator of talent for us," says Zarghami.

"Jamie Lynn's Q [public recognition] scores from 'All That' were a pretty good indicator that the audience would respond to the show."

Zarghami says the concept of "Zoey 101" has helped draw viewers. The opening night audience for "Zoey" was 3.3 million viewers and the second episode of "Zoey 101," which aired last Sunday, did even better - snaring 3.7 million total viewers and 1.7 million tweens.