The first radio blog post I did back in 2006 was speculating about the future of college radio (or impending demise). I was finding more and more student run stations either running on automation full time, turned over to state run NPR networks or just derelict.
Augustana College’s station KAUR-FM in Sioux Falls, SD is the latest to call it quits. In this case, it isn’t lack of funding – it’s that there was only 1 student even interested in working on the station. With radio companies laying off large numbers of people, and college age students having very little interest in listening to radio, this should not be a shocker.
I considered joining the college radio station when I was in college a few years ago. I was appalled to find that they wanted to run a tight chart-based indie rock format… hardly the type of place where a conservative leaning public-affairs talk show would have fit in :) Or anything else for that matter.
If they want to run a student radio station, it’s my opinion that it should be freeform. As long as pop-music radio continues its slow decline, let’s ditch this facade of teaching them what it’s like to work at a “real” station and let them pick the music they want to play– as long as it follows FCC standards, of course. If they want to play country, play country. Oldies? Sure. Indie-rock… if that’s your bag, go for it, but please don’t force everyone to play it. If kids get to play the kind of music they want, or even do the occasional talk show, it would get people interested… not just students, but the whole community.
Yale University has an AM radio station (WYBC) that is 1 kw day/night. It’s one of the few AM stations I can get at my house.
Almost all of the time, it is running on computer automation running random music just to preserve the license. A few years ago, a couple guys there did try to do a Conservative talk show, but with little promotion and probably not even having equipment to put callers on the air with a 7 second delay, I was probably the only listener. Right now, it is just a waste of spectrum.
One of my favorite observations growing up in the 1970s was how odd it was that every one of the “non-conformists” wore bell bottom blue jeans.
I worked in college radio back in the “golden age” of the 1980’s. We played mostly music that you didn’t hear anywhere else on the dial, but there was also free form stuff and many students had the opportunity to practice putting together and airing newcasts.
I used to love watching the AP ticker kick out breaking news! I have become spoiled by the internet and the instant access to news and sports scores.
With the many budget cutbacks at our campuses, college radio will be gone within the next 5-10 years in my opinion. Part of the reason is that kids today don’t listen to ANY radio — they prefer itunes/ipod and in many ways I cannot blame them.
As a talk radio listener I grow tired of the 25+ minutes of commercials per hour — especially when it is the SAME Ad Council government PC stuff over and over again.