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Another college station sold

Students at student run stations and those that employ much student talent must be ready to defend their need for an FM frequency to their owner/administration. They must be ready to help the Administration understand how valuable in uniq
 
Sorry, I hit a wrong button... Anyway, they've got to be able to share how unique it is to have an FM frequency and try to make sure their administration won't buy into the lie that internet-only is a way to go. The internet is fine, as an added way to build listenership. But, it starts with a vibrant over-the-air facility. Given no frequency allocation issues, the internet is a wild west and most people just don't want to take the time to fish through all the junk to find the genuine pearls that probably do exist. If some schlemeel comes in and starts suggesting that you drop your FM, the first question is ... If the over-the-air station is so useless, why do you want it? If internet-only is the way to go, why don't you do that instead of plopping down possibly big bucks for the FM station? Don't buy the lies!
 
Unfortunately, the writer of that article misses the bigger point: Colleges and universities simply don't have the money, nor do they have the responsibility, or serving their local community. That simply is not a part of their job, especially when we're talking about private schools. So while it is nice to provide a voice for the local community, it isn't worth spending money meant for students. The students resent seeing their fees and tuitions go up every year. The only solution is for these college stations to become self-sufficient. That way, they don't become a burden to their licensees. Plus by obtaining funding from their listeners, they can prove in a very clear way that they in fact are serving the community, and not just the egos of those on the air.
 
Let me add that I find it interesting that neither colleges nor conservatives want to fund non-commercial radio. I often read comments complaining about how deregulation hurt broadcasting, and led to fewer voices and less ownership diversity. But here's a situation that is outside of deregulation, where licensees are voluntarily giving up their places on the dial, limiting community voices, and promoting less ownership diversity. Conservatives forced the transfer of NJ Public Broadcasting to more powerful stations in NY and Philly. Other states are seeking ways to cut back on funding for public broadcasting. This will lead to more consolidation in ownership and fewer voices on the air. The public has to decide if community service is worth community funding.
 
TheBigA said:
Unfortunately, the writer of that article misses the bigger point: Colleges and universities simply don't have the money, nor do they have the responsibility, or serving their local community. That simply is not a part of their job, especially when we're talking about private schools.
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That is a rather declarative statement of finality... and it deserves a challenge. Rather than slamming the door and saying: "That issue is hereby resolved and settled..." let's put it out for discussion.

My nearest college does several things that express the idea: "We have a responsibility to serve the local community." The event that called it to my attention occurred two year ago when they kicked off a lecture series where each week a different professor makes the circuit in two neighboring counties to present a lecture and engage in a discussion forum on some international relations subject. I've gotten to know several of the professors and member of the administration. And through that venue... at announcement time... I have learned of other things the college is doing that meet the definition of "serving the community".

This happens to be a state college. And the sponsor, the champion, the "get 'er done" person for the series is the President of the University Foundation. And in exploring with him privately the thrust of his work and the foundation, I have come to the conclusion there is a lot less that differentiates a private university from a state university than ever before. I learned from him that a number of well known state universities receive as little as 5 to 10% of their operatiing funds from the state. I will hazard a guess that most so-called private universities get no more than that and maybe even less from the church denomination or other private group that founded and claims to sponsor the private universities. (I don't know about other groups but for several years I followed the 'falling dominoes" as school after school in the Southern Baptist organization told the state "convention" to keep their money... and their restrictions... and went more or less independent.

Whether they are state owned or private schools, most universities seem to be using the same "foundation" vehicle for major portions of their finance coupled with contracting for research grants.

Now, we are back to the basic question: does a college owned radio station serve any useful purpose in this homogenized world? Should such a radio station be operated by industry standards of programming which requires paid staff... or should they be student run with the resulting "non industry standard" results in sound and programming?

I'm kind of down the middle on that one. For the sake of debate, I could argue either side of that proposition.

It would seem to me that getting a degree that is related to participating in a student operated campus radio station is a bit like earning a degree in philosophy or English Literature. Nice, pleasant, but probably a bus ticket to "unable to find employment". The students on campus who are focused on getting a degree in some "hot specialty of the day" which will then be coupled with a graduate degree such as an MBA are going to look at the student run radio station as kin to joining the campus Butterfly Club.

My guess is that a lot of the student run stations do not serve the student body of the college in any useful way, and do not serve the community in any useful way. As a hopeless member of the Philosophy Club and a romantic about English Literature, I hope some of you can prove me wrong in this debate.
 
TheBigA, your point is valid overall, but it's only tangential to WRVU. The direct student control of WRVU (via the VSC) worked against them in this case: they sacrificed a less-popular student media outlet (the radio station) to support the more-popular outlets (the newspaper, and also some campus magazines).

I think there's a strong possibility even if WRVU had been fiscally self-sufficient, it wouldn't have mattered.

OTOH, I think...and have been preaching this particular gospel...that for most college-owned radio stations, being fiscally self-sufficient is no longer "a good idea", it's a necessary defense against the inevitable budget cuts rampaging through virtually every college and university in America.
 
Goat Rodeo Cowboy said:
Whether they are state owned or private schools, most universities seem to be using the same "foundation" vehicle for major portions of their finance coupled with contracting for research grants.
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But the key difference is that, at least for the moment, most state colleges still feel a sense of community responsibility. While the private ones don't. I should have made that point clearer. Both Vanderbilt and Rice are private schools. That may change as the governors of those states start to make ideological changes in terms of the way state funding is used at those colleges.

Goat Rodeo Cowboy said:
My guess is that a lot of the student run stations do not serve the student body of the college in any useful way, and do not serve the community in any useful way. As a hopeless member of the Philosophy Club and a romantic about English Literature, I hope some of you can prove me wrong in this debate.
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I can't speak about a lot of them. I just know that the three specific ones that have been sold recently didn't. And that proved to be their downfall. There is a way to provide the work experience needed for communications students without owning a radio license. There are internships, which are far more useful in terms of real experience than doing unsupervised radio shows on a college station.
 
GRC, having worked in and for colleges for most of my professional career, I can assure you that colleges ALWAYS act in their own self-interest. There may be, and often are, times when their own self-interest happens to be that they need good town/gown relations. And politics often plays a role given how many colleges are expected to make Payments In Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) and that is purely a politically-driven process. Plus you have to factor in whether a college is tuition-driven or endowment-driven...by which I mean tuition-driven schools typically take less than 10% of their annual revenue from endowment dividend payments...and that has tremendous impact on everything a college does - including off-campus relations.

So the bottom line is not always 100% driven by dollars in a direct sense, but nevertheless, the bottom line is still the only thing that matters.

The key aspect that "protected" college radio from "the bottom line" for so long was that radio was the primary (if not only) method by which people experienced new music. That put a premium on student involvement at the station, so much so that even if a college radio station was costing more than every other student group combined, it was justifiable because there were 150-200 students involved (more than any other activity, usually, save for athletics) and often a good hunk of the student body was listening as well.

Today, that's true for some places but demonstrably untrue for many, if not most. The internet has replaced radio as the primary means by which most under-30 people experience new music. That eliminates the on-campus listening audience, and it drastically reduces the cache of "working" at the station, so the number of student volunteers has dwindled dramatically as well.

The only substantially-sized group that still passionately believes in college radio is usually the off-campus audience, and often that off-campus audience has little to no impact on the college itself. It doesn't pay tuition. It doesn't give lots of money. It doesn't impact the college politically. So why should the college care what they think? It'd be like the Red Sox being excessively worried about what diehard Bruins hockey fanatics think of them. Sure, there's a loose connection in that they're both sports, and both sports in Boston, but otherwise...who cares?

Now if a radio station is fiscally self-supporting, that does make a difference. Mostly because there's very few departments in a college that can do such a thing, so it carries weight with the higher-ups. And it reduces the argument for a sale when a department isn't costing the college anything, and when a sale would not only destroy that revenue source, but likely engender noticeably political backlash...quite possibly extending into constituents that a college does care about.
 
aaronread said:
I think there's a strong possibility even if WRVU had been fiscally self-sufficient, it wouldn't have mattered.
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Probably. From what I've read, the bigger issue was the fact that this station was largely staffed by non-students. It was a station out of control, which was also the problem at Rice and USF.

I think being self-sufficient at least takes the student funding issue off the table. I can understand the resentment of students who see their fees and tuition going up, while a big chunk of money is being used to fund a radio station for non-students. And a lot of it has to do with percentages. When a conservative complains about federal funding for public broadcasting, and it's only a small portion of the station's budget, it seems petty and ideological. Because most federal funds are designed as "matching funds" that require a larger amount of local contributions from actual users in order to qualify for the federal grant. But when the entire budget comes from the feds or the college, it's unfair to the majority who don't use the service. It's one thing to SAY a station provides community service. It's quite another to prove it through lists of local donors. The public radio stations can do that, and the college stations failed.
 
Probably. From what I've read, the bigger issue was the fact that this station was largely staffed by non-students. It was a station out of control, which was also the problem at Rice and USF.

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75 - 100 student dj's over the last couple of semesters. 25 community volunteers.

Nock
 
Yeah, and many of those "community" deadbeats (the ones obviously causing the ship to be out of control) filled in during the summer, when all the Vandy students were on their yachts and planes. Nock was a great example...playing the devil's music...

I bet 5% of the student body even cared that their was a small "fee" for WRVU, and 2% of them really cared enough to think twice about it. Same for who the hell "worked" there.

WHAT REALLY happened at had nothing to do with the student fee and EVERYTHING to do with a way to sell off the station at it's maximum profit. (Note: has anyone, as a student, asked for a discount on their fees that reflect their % of proceeds from this sell? Not yet.) The inside politics and real logic is a totally different issue for a different post. Whether the station had the support of the current student body is merely a sign of times changing. No student station has that much support because let's face it...playing radio station isn't as cool as it was twenty years ago. Same could be said is true in all forms of radio, but honesty isn't always high on the list of an industry taking on water.

The fact that we are BR0KE as a nation IS reason alone that we don't need to be wasting our time spending $100's of millions on public radio. Let the stations be funded by legit advertising that agrees to not interfere with the content and the conservatives, as you say, will leave the damn channels alone. Not like they ain't runnin spots anyway...just in a "hidden" and "unobivious" way. Yawn!
 
Tibbs2 said:
WHAT REALLY happened at had nothing to do with the student fee and EVERYTHING to do with a way to sell off the station at it's maximum profit.
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If that was the goal, then they should have sold it 5 years ago. Would have brought ten times as much money.

I agree with the comment that the online station will disappear in a few years.
 
That is true. Interestingly, the fact that the students at VU were replaced with PAID adults in the key management positions of various student media, perhaps, eventually, even negates the $3.35M purchase price, if they all stay in their jobs. I see the need to consider and even execute the sales of various college stations, but in the RVU case, the evidence is showing a huge power trip and virtual lack of integrity that could have easily been avoided. It's seeming like it's more of a "how" vs. "why" reaction that has been triggered and this may not go away.
 
Tibbs2 said:
I see the need to consider and even execute the sales of various college stations, but in the RVU case, the evidence is showing a huge power trip and virtual lack of integrity that could have easily been avoided.
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At the end of the day, the workers have to serve the owner, whoever that is. If it's John Hogan or John Dickie, or some guy in charge of the student media board. If you're not stroking him, sooner or later you're going to be gone. If these students learned that from this experience, then it's a good lesson that will serve them well in the real world. They made the mistake of thinking they were in the community service business. They were wrong.
 
Here’s more on the topic —this time in a commentary piece on Inside Higher Ed:

BlogU: College Radio
 
The one difference is that this is a state school, part of SUNY. Most of the other college stations sold were from private colleges. In fact the Rice station was bought by a state college.
 
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