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NPR and college stations

B

baldyman

Guest
I work at WREK - Atlanta 91.1FM which is run by Georgia Tech students. Recently Georgia Public Broadcasting and Public Broadcasting Atlanta (they are two different competing entities) have expressed interested in "partnering" with WREK. The schools administration is looking at their proposals and will eventually decide one way or another. I am really leary of doing anything with NPR stuff because I have always heard they like to take over student stations. Also i don't want to trade student air time for NPR air time. I know they kicked the students out of WUWG 90.7FM which belongs to the University of West Georgia. Does anyone know of any other instances of NPR and college stations doing stuff together and what was the result?
 
I spent a lot of time looking at college station websites over the summer, and from what I saw everything was either NPR/professional or student-run. I don't recall seeing any middle ground. I guess the deal usually it is it's student run or it isn't.

If you don't want to take away time from students for NPR programming, what's the point of partnering with NPR if not for the programming?
 
Well I don't want to partner with NPR but some people in the administration think it would be a good idea. I was looking for case historys where it turned out to screw the students.
 
baldyman said:
I work at WREK - Atlanta 91.1FM which is run by Georgia Tech students. Recently Georgia Public Broadcasting and Public Broadcasting Atlanta (they are two different competing entities) have expressed interested in "partnering" with WREK. The schools administration is looking at their proposals and will eventually decide one way or another. I am really leary of doing anything with NPR stuff because I have always heard they like to take over student stations. Also i don't want to trade student air time for NPR air time. I know they kicked the students out of WUWG 90.7FM which belongs to the University of West Georgia. Does anyone know of any other instances of NPR and college stations doing stuff together and what was the result?
Click to expand...

when I was PD at WUOG (90.5 Athens) in '80, the faculty was always clamoring for us to carry NPR programming, but it was really a code-phrase for "All classical". We did take whatever free programming we could get from NPR (usually the weekly symphonies on tape, and a couple of radio plays), but we'd never be able to afford the sat feed, and the T1 feed we could get split off from Atlanta would've still broken our budget and would've been bad audio to boot. After a few years the Admins saw the light and created a second station (WUGA 91.7) with a full NPR membership.

The No-Brainer thing to do is convert to HD. It seems that's really the way to go, eventually. Keep the student-run station as the main analog, and send out the NPR station on a digital.
 
You are right about NPR taking over "student-run" college stations. Perfect example of that would be in Winston-Salem, North Carolina at WSNC-FM. The station is about 80 percent NPR programming.
 
I have mixed feelings on this issue.

I volunteer at a college station, WEOS in Geneva, New York. This station started out as a student/community station, but because of a lack of interest among students at the college, they picked up NPR programming in the early 90s. But unlike most college stations that added NPR programs, WEOS kept a decent amount of airtime open for student and community shows, mostly at night.

Today, WEOS enjoys a loyal following in the Finger Lakes region of NY, and we have the listener pledges to prove it. So, one could argue that the decision to carry NPR was the right thing to do. Though, I must admit I wish there was more time available on the station for more local programming. I consider myself extremely fortunate (and grateful) that I am able to do my show.

Another example here in upstate NY is WRUR, the station at the University of Rochester. In 2003, the university formed a partnership with the city's public broadcaster, WXXI. The initial agreement, as I understood it, was that in exchange for WRUR carrying a few hours of NPR news from WXXI's AM station, WXXI would in turn give WRUR new studio equipment, and students would be given the chance to do internships at WXXI.

So, what you had initially was the original free form format of WRUR still left intact, with the exception of morning and afternoon drive which were now occupied by Morning Edition, and All Things Considered.

Of course, things changed. Eventually, a "format" (tripple A) was put in place on WRUR during the day, including the addition of World Cafe to the schedule. Student shows were relagated to evenings, and some of the more popular community programming was kept on weekends. This is still the basic formula of the station today.

My take? I have to admit I wasn't entirely thrilled by the changes to the station, but, again, there were some serious issues with the way students were running the station. So, something had to be done. I guess my biggest complaint with this particular situation has always been that a lot of very dedicated student and community DJs lost their shows in the transition. And yes, I realize that the radio business is not always kind, especially to some of the more specialized aspects of programming, but I wish more could have been done to retain more local programming.

Unfortunately for you, I think it is a pretty safe bet that NPR programming WILL eventually end up at WREK. Like it or not, that programming WILL attract more listeners, (not to mention the dollars said listeners will donate to the station in favor of the programming) and perhaps even a few more points in the Atlanta ratings. In radio, money and raitings talk, and they talk very loudly, too.

My suggestion to you is that you and the other students involved with the station start a respectful petition. Let the faculty know that you want to keep WREK as is. At least you will be making your voice known.

If, however, they decide to bring in NPR programming, you should make the best of the situation, and be grateful for the opportunity you will still have to do shows.

My suggestions and opinions. Whatever they might be worth.
 
Even if there's "serious issues" with the way students run the station...well, it just shows laziness on the part of administrators to "deal" with it by simply getting rid of the students. And as your examples show, once NPR "partners" with a college station, that partnership tends to move in only one direction: more NPR and less student programming over time.

And that agreement is pretty silly...new studio equipment and internships? Come on. With some effort, the stations could raise money or apply for grants to get new equipment on their own without selling out much of their airtime to another entity. And internships? Geez, any student already majoring in media/communications or with some media experience could probably get one regardless of whether any "partnership" exists. It seems like a bad, bad deal to me.
 
I am in total agreement with you, Neo. I think it was total apathy on the part of the U of R that led to the current situation at WRUR. If they had made a greater effort, and if they were willing to put more money into the station, they may not have had to turn to WXXI for assistance.

While I'm not totally thrilled with the current format, for reasons I mentioned in my last post, I must admit that the alternative would have been much worse.

When this partnership was first announced, I remember reading that some broadcasters, (most likely national chain religious broadcasters), were seriously considering mounting challenges to WRUR's license. This was due mainly to the station not operating 24 hours a day, (it wasn't all that unusual for WRUR to sign off in the middle of the day because there were no live jocks available, and they had no automation to speak of). Had there been a challenge, you might have seen Bible Broadcasting Network, or American Family Radio taking over the 88.5 frequency in Rochester. When I think of what could have happened, I'll take the NPR partnership over piped in pay for pray programming any day.

I honeatly think that broadcasters like BBN and AFR and EMF are an even greater threat to college radio than NPR ever was. It would be very easy for one of the above broadcasters to offer a school millions of dollars for their station's livense, and most colleges would most likely take the money. They would say that the students could still broadcast on the internet, and that the money they would get for the FM license would "greatly benefit" the school. And with FM radio listening on the decline among young people, I fear you may see more of this in the years to come.

I hope I'm wrong.
 
JakeLongwell said:
When this partnership was first announced, I remember reading that some broadcasters, (most likely national chain religious broadcasters), were seriously considering mounting challenges to WRUR's license. This was due mainly to the station not operating 24 hours a day, (it wasn't all that unusual for WRUR to sign off in the middle of the day because there were no live jocks available, and they had no automation to speak of). Had there been a challenge, you might have seen Bible Broadcasting Network, or American Family Radio taking over the 88.5 frequency in Rochester. When I think of what could have happened, I'll take the NPR partnership over piped in pay for pray programming any day.
Click to expand...

Having been rather close to the situation in question, I'm a little restricted in how much I care to say here about what happened and why - but I do want to clarify one point of terminology.

There's no "NPR partnership," per se. NPR is a national programming provider. They don't own or operate stations. They don't "take over" college stations. They sell programming to the local entities (whether they be community nonprofits, like WXXI, or colleges, like WEOS' parent, Hobart and William Smith) that own and operate the local stations.

So the partnership isn't between the U of R and a national organization...it's between the U of R and another locally-based entity, WXXI (and indeed, WXXI provides as much non-NPR programming to WRUR as it does NPR network material these days.)

Without getting too deep into might-haves or should-haves or the various personalities and institutions involved, I'll just say that I think in the end, things worked out pretty well: students still have access to airtime on a facility with a wider reach than what they had before, community listeners are served with programming options they didn't have before (NPR news on FM, AAA music during the day, etc.), and the station's still in local hands. It could easily have turned out, as Jake says, much worse.
 
Except for a handful (I believe there are fewer than a half-dozen nationwide) of exceptions, if you are an NPR member station, then you are required to have five full-time staff members. That much payroll means you've got to have a pretty solid fundraising/underwriting system in place, and in turn, that usually means pubradio programming at the expense of student programming. And listeners generally do not like "mixed use" stations that have both NPR and student programming on it, so that's why you generally don't see student deejays at NPR affiliates.

That doesn't mean students aren't always involved, though....at WEOS we have very few student DJ's, and will have none after this semester. (they're all moving to WHWS) But we'll still have students at WEOS: newscasters, sportscasters, community calendar announcers, live event engineers, etc etc etc.

_________________________________________________

As for WREK, here's the questions your administration is asking themselves:
  • Does the station serve as part of a formal class curriculum?
  • If not, how many students does it directly benefit as a student activity?
  • How much does it cost?

If it's a class curriculum, then often you are "safe" because you're part of the core mission of the college. Even then, can't rest on your laurels. But if you're just a student activity then you're probably hosed; more than likely WREK's budget is more than all the other student activities combined and that's just too expensive a proposition for an activity that really only benefits the few dozen students directly working/volunteering at the station. Certainly there are other student activities with much better ROI.

Now, if you have solid Arbitron/RRC ratings, then you've got the ability to raise your own funds. And if you do so, then you affect that ROI equations because you're lowering the cost to the school.

Depending on your alumni situation, there may also be a "cost" associated with "going NPR" in terms of alumni donations...but I wouldn't get too excited about that route; you don't DARE try and pull an end-run around the alumni office to reach the alums. It will engender tremendous ill-will from the entire administration towards you. Similarly, don't bother trying to get the campus student body into a frenzy to support you. Any college knows they can ride out a student protest if the ROI is there. By definition it won't last more than three or four years...max...and that's small time to a college. Money talks a lot louder than student protests.

My advice is to take a hard look at how much money you can bring in the door before summer break. (because if word has leaked out already, I would bet that the college plans to enact this over this summer break) If you haven't run fundraisers before, hire a consultant to help you get one done fast and dirty (trust me, you can't learn this stuff that quickly on your own). Try and find an professional salesperson to get you underwriting ASAP if you don't have one already. Pay them commission-only and make it a generous commission (like 50%) so you can get someone quick. And yes, at the core of this is that you may...MAY...have to take a long, hard look at your current programming format and whether or not its fiscally viable for the long term. It may be, it may not be. Or it might be viable with some small changes, or it might need a total overhaul. One thing you've got going for you is that WREK is a gigantic signal in a top ten market, so you've inherently got a cash machine at your fingertips...play it right and you'll be financially self-sufficient in a few years, and no college wants to mess with a department that's financially self-sufficient.

I'm also assuming that doing nothing is not an option, because if the ROI wasn't in play, there wouldn't even be any discussion about this in the first place! And yes, you might have to give up some things. But if you do the negotiation at least it'll be on YOUR terms, not the administration's...that means you can be much more choosy about what to preserve in terms of student involvement. For example, perhaps you'll "lose" WREK in the end, but if you work the deal where an HD2 channel is devoted to maintaining the existing student format, well that's not so bad. Could be a lot worse. Or if the students get a webcast-only "station" but the NPR outlet is required to pay for a professional to help you run it and make sure it mimics the radio station experience as much as possible (it can be done, I've seen it work) then you haven't lost as much as you might think.

_________________________________________________

I can echo Scott's sentiment about WRUR, too. I know more than I should probably talk publicly about, but while one could argue that U of R students "lost" a lot in the deal, they lost a lot less than they could've...and in many ways they're gaining some real benefits, too.
 
Just to clarify a bit on what Aaron mentioned, there are requirements that NPR sets in order for stations to be FULL MEMBER stations. Having 5 full time employees is one of them, but there are many stations across the country that broadcast NPR programming without meeting those requirements. I believe such stations are called "Associate Member" stations, but several of them are out there.

One such station near here does indeed have student DJs running NPR shows and such, but as Aaron suggests, it is not what would normally be considered a true College Radio format.

Oh, and they do NOT have a "solid fundraising/underwriting" in place either, but evidently they do receive CPB funding.

My station, KOHM-FM, was put on the air to be the local NPR/Classical music station in order to PRESERVE the student FM the university already had. The student FM, KTXT, was run under the Mass Comm Department as part of the academic curriculum at the time. After the GM, who was part of the teaching faculty retired, the station was moved under the University Newspaper. Mass Comm revamped its program and basically stopped teaching courses in audio production and radio hence the move. The newspaper then ran the station using student fees charged as part of their "media" fee. As their costs increased, the newspaper finally decided to shut down the student station. This happened last December. In the ultimate twist of irony, KOHM then inherited the station it was meant to preserve. We do not have proper facilities to run KTXT so no students are currently involved with it. Basically it's being run by some dirt cheap software (Raduga) on a recycled Dell desktop PC. I got my start on the student FM and now manage the NPR side. I understand both sides of the issue pretty well.

I also believe that the station down at Baylor was previously a student station. The admin there decided to turn it into an NPR station effectively killing the student format. And Aaron is correct- admin will always win because THEY are the ones who actually hold the license.

I think the student DJs here incorrectly assumed they had the ear of the entire student population, and that certainly wasn't the case. When it came time to protest the paper's decision to shut down KTXT, it was a mere whimper- most students didn't even know there was a student FM, didn't realize they were paying for it in their fees, and certainly didn't miss it after it was shut down. I really think that ultimately, KTXT failed to serve its student audience. I blame the folks at the paper for this and not the students running the station. The lesson I see here at Texas Tech is that KTXT simply did not compete against various other e-media. Think about all of the myriad e-media choices students now have. KTXT wasn't lost last December, it became lost years ago when more and more of its audience went elsewhere for content. And that in a nutshell is the problem facing ALL of broadcasting, not just College Radio. I do believe if the station had truly served the students more, the outcome may have been different.

The secret for any station to survive is to serve its audience better than the next guy.

-DG
 
The "Auxiliary Member" class of stations for NPR was eliminated back in the early 1990's, IIRC. There were several stations "grandfathered in" at that level, WEOS is one of them. But many of them "upgraded" to full member status before too long; there's limits on the total population your signal (60dBu service contour) can cover before you're required to do so. When I asked my NPR rep about this last year, he told he thought there were fewer than a dozen left in the USA, possibly fewer than a half-dozen. And WEOS was the only one anywhere near the northeastern US...most are in the Plains States, the Southwest, or the Rockies; areas with very low population density.

Worth noting: there are lots of non-NPR member stations running public radio programming. There aren't too many running actual NPR-licensed programming. Honestly I'm not sure there are any; NPR is pretty strict these days about requiring membership before you can legally air their programming. Public Radio Int'l (PRI) and American Public Media (APM)...especially APM...are also pretty strict. But there's tons of public-radio-ish programming out there that's not distributed by NPR, PRI or APM. Pacifica's stuff, like Free Speech Radio News and Democracy Now, comes immediately to mind. Other shows like Alternative Radio, World Vision Report, War News Radio, Le Show, and Tech Nation are just a few more. The problem with all public radio programming being identified as "NPR" programming is a constant irritation for both NPR and non-NPR entities alike...remember that flap with Fred Goodwin a couple years ago?

That said, it wouldn't surprise me if there are exceptions out there...especially in the low-pop-density areas like western Texas, the Midwest, etc. Especially stations that started taking NPR stuff prior to the mid-1990's, when things were a little looser at 635 Mass Ave in DC. NPR might be strict about taking on new stations now, but they're generally loathe to kick a station off the member rolls.

Also FWIW, I hope the station DG mentions as not having a "solid fundraising/underwriting" program in place gets one soon. CPB has very clearly defined goals for revenue that stations must meet or they'll lose their Community Service Grant (the CSG is the staple of CPB funding) after so many years (I think it's four). :'(
 
Yes, Aux. Member was eliminated, but as you say, several such stations still exist regardless of what they're called.

The station I'm referring to is KOCV-FM in Odessa. They are NOT a full NPR member, but they did receive the Content Depot and basic Enco automation when SOSS went away, so I assume they paid something for PRSS services. We did confirm that they do carry NPR programming at a much reduced rate- probably because of the lack of primary service down there. If there was already a full member station there, than it would be a much different story I'm sure. Forget population density in Far West Texas- they count cactus needles and buzzards down there more than people!

On a semi-related note, we were also told by the network that several network groups across the U.S. are in financial arrears and have been for several years, but NPR will be cracking down on them due to the economic downturn. Something about over-expansion into areas with little ROI. Gee, how many apps were filed in the last window? ;D

KWBU was the student-run station at Baylor. It became an NPR affiliate in 2001. Baylor is a Baptist University and I've always wondered if their previous College format led to the switch.

Hope you get your Marti fixed Aaron!

:)

-DG
 
Never been to Odessa, but most Christmases are spent with the inlaws in Dallas and then a few days out in Coleman, which is "near" Abiliene...and by "near" I mean about an hour's drive SSE. It feels like the middle of nowhere but it really isn't; you just have to drive through the middle of nowhere (also known as "Cross Plains") to get there! ;D

Yeah, I'm not surprised KOCV is a grandfathered aux member. They're not the only NCE in town, but the other FIVE non-comm's are all religious broadcasters. Yeesh. And not another NPR outlet for miles around, either. NPR's in no hurry to force KOCV to become a full member; they'd lose the only NPR outlet in town!
 
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