Travis Vail / Roundup
Pierce College debuted its new online radio station, KPCRadio, at noon today following a launch party to congratulate the students and faculty involved.
“This is a collaboration between many people,” said Jose Luis Fernandez, Dean of Career and Technical Education and Green and Sustainability. “It’s not just students, but faculty and administrators are involved as well.”
Fernandez worked alongside the Vice Chancellor for Institutional Effectiveness, Marvin Martinez, to acquire much of the funding required to finance the radio project.
Fernandez sought funding from the Career Technical Education Industry Collaborative as well as the Vocational Technical Education Act to cover the project’s estimated cost of $100,000.
According to Amara Aguilar, assistant professor of multimedia, the radio station has been in development for the most of this academic year.
Student Program Director Natalie Yemenidjian is very enthusiastic about the station’s launch.
“We’re focusing more on storytelling than news casting; we want to talk about the people who live in the valley,” said Yemenidjian. “We have 23 students involved in the radio station, and everyone contributes.”
Jeff Favre, adjunct professor of journalism, shares Yemenidjian’s optimism for the station’s future.
“We’re trying to fill a niche which is that the valley doesn’t have a radio station,” said Favre. “Our hope is that we will eventually have short range broadcasts, but we aren’t able to do that yet.”
KPCR can be listened to at KPCRadio.com as well as SHOUTcast.com, and any students interested in producing a radio program may pursue this by enrolling in broadcasting 10.
“If you’re a student and have passion for a show or idea, you should pitch it to us,” said Favre.
“We made [KPCR] for the students,” said Fernandez. “That’s the beauty of this.”
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(Photo Courtsey of Jill Conelley)
(Photo Courtsey of Amara Aguilar)