How to take over a radio show in a few easy steps: gather college students in three separate rooms on one campus, strike up a Zoom call with the producer of the show RadioACTive in a booth at the KRCL station in Salt Lake City and then hit record.
If only it were that easy. But two months into the weekly takeover, KRCL RadioACTive host Lara Jones makes the process seem smooth when students in Marcie Young Cancio’s COMM 2900 Special Projects class get together to record a one-hour show. It was Jones’ idea, and Young Cancio drew up an entire semester-long curriculum around it. The rest is radio history in the making.
“I feel my role beyond the microphone is to help people express themselves,” Jones said. “Our history at RadioACTive is that we’re community led. I felt this project was important in terms of mentoring the next generation of journalism students so that they have hands-on experience, to learn the difference between reporting mediums.”
So-called takeovers are nothing new at KRCL, but this is the first time anyone can recall a class of college students writing, hosting and recording the entire program. Young Cancio hopes this will be a recurring course each semester. “I want them to be excited about journalism and the many mediums for which it can be produced,” she said. “We no longer live in a linear media world, and every opportunity, whether students intend to follow a radio career, helps build a stronger understanding of the landscape.”
The inaugural group of 10 students has been splitting shows between two groups, coming up with their own ideas for topics and guests, recording intros, outros and promos, writing scripted material, adlibbing – basically running the show. Jones offers advice as they move along, records everything on her end on Wednesdays and stitches all the segments together into one seamless show that airs at 6 p.m. every Monday. The first program aired Jan. 31, and the last one will be broadcast live on May 2 – with the COVID-19 pandemic less of a threat to public health these days, the final show is expected to be hosted in the KRCL studios.
During one show this past spring, when the topics were “impacts of the internet on mental health” and how SLCC is an emerging Hispanic Serving Institution, Zay Angel Alvarez produced the show on his end at South City Campus. A bit of a renaissance man, Alvarez is a photographer, social media consultant and is currently working toward a bachelor’s degree in film. The COMM 2900 class has opened his eyes to telling people’s stories through radio. “I love interacting with people,” Alvarez said. “I love talking to people and bring something of value to the community.”
Some of the content has been powerful and exclusive to the show, like the April 4 airing of an interview with a couple – the husband is a college student in Utah and from Ukraine – who gave birth in his home country in a city that was under siege. “I had no idea we had such an incredible journalism program,” Alexie Zollinger said about when she first started attending SLCC in the fall of 2019. “It’s almost disappointing thinking about going to a four-year school from here, because you don’t have these kinds of opportunities there.” Zollinger said she plans to graduate from SLCC this fall with an associate’s degree in Journalism and Digital Media and then pursue a bachelor’s degree in journalism.
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