When I was in school, maaaaany moons ago, I remember we had morning announcements done over the P.A., but it was in the style of morning news. It sounded like a radio morning show. We all loved it! Made listening to announcements a lot easier and, well, we ACTUALLY listened. I’ve seen this trend dissipate quickly. I don’t know of any schools that still have a student radio-esque style announcement crew.
The benefit of having this program outweighs the burden of adding a new class. Not only can it help with public speaking, but it can help with sales as well!
I realize adding something into the school curriculum is nearly impossible, so why not turn it into a promotion of sorts?
Pitch the idea over the airwaves. You will pick ONE senior class to teach about radio, public speaking, promotions, and sales! It can be an end of the year deal for seniors! THEN use some of those seniors as street teamers! Getting the cart before the horse, let’s go back to the beginning and logistics of it all.
Depending on the class size, multiple in-house stations can be involved. Divide the class between the stations. From there, divide your station’s group into sub-groups: on-air, production, promotions, and sales. Each subgroup has their own “teacher” from the station or company.
This could be a two week situation. It can get as in-depth, or not, as you want. The kids would come every day for a couple hours for two weeks…or longer…whatever you prefer. If it’s two weeks; each sub-group gets two days on each topic. The last day you come together as a group and find out what they liked, didn’t like, learned, etc.
Let them be on-air, let them mock sell a promotion, let them create a promotion, let them write and voice a spot. Again, this can get pretty detailed, but it doesn’t have to be the first time around.
The way this is beneficial to you is the fact you are getting in front of potential listeners and showing you care about the future of our kids. Getting involved in the community is huge for listenership. Also, if the school finds it was useful, they may incorporate student radio again!
Also, you can sell this! Sell the ads on air, sell the space on the website, get creative…your sales teams will know what to do.
Most of all, have fun! It may reignite that radio fire in you!
2 thoughts on “What Happened to Student Radio?”
Student radio is alive and well at Dean College, and our graduates are still getting radio jobs! Many of our students intern at radio, TV and sports broadcast opportunities. Check out our station at http://www.power883.org.
As a high school kid I leaned science from a teacher who loved radio and helped me learn so many things about it. I was a weekend disk jockey for WAMH-FM at Amherst College and later formed a company called Educational FM Associates. We helped prepare FCC applications for more than a hundred colleges and high schools to get FM broadcast station licenses and a majority of those stations are still on the air. Radio remains wonderful. And schools are where folks in our new generations learn more about it and then become part of the business. For 48 years I’ve owned and operated a commercial FM station just south of Boston. During those 48 years we’ve helped many students learn about and then get into the broadcasting business. So thanks to you for helping students become interested in radio and helping them become broadcasters.