UCLARadio makes airwaves
By Mia Sable
June 12, 2005 9:00 p.m.
Much like “Cheers,” UCLA’s on-campus radio
station is a place where everybody knows your name.
Formerly KLA, the renamed UCLARadio.com is a launching pad for
UCLA students hoping to gain industry experience, as well as a
forum for friendships to form. Eric Lawrence, now the head music
librarian at public radio station KCRW, described his college radio
days as a bonding experience.
“It was very much my social group when at UCLA,”
Lawrence said. “At some level, it was kind of like our
fraternity or sorority. We all just sort of hung out at the station
in between classes and afterward hung out at each other’s
shows.”
Lawrence began his radio career at UCLA as a freshman in 1988,
and he found the UCLA radio station to be a tight-knit community.
Years after his graduation, Lawrence still benefits from his time
spent at the station.
“A lot of my friends from my college days were the people
who worked at the station, and I do hang out with a number of those
people on a regular basis. In fact, I ended up in a band with a
couple of old KLA cronies,” he said.
The arguably underfunded station has been prone to technical
difficulties lately, with DJs forced to use headsets in place of
broken studio microphones. Graduating fourth-year communication
studies student Danny Lee found that the challenges of working at
the station have helped him to be ready for anything, especially
after the power went out in the middle of his show. Lee, a sports
broadcaster, had had a writer from the Los Angeles Times sports
section booked for an interview.
“The phones weren’t working,” said Lee.
“I had him call my cell phone, and (put it) up to the
microphone and turned all the levels up. I didn’t want to
ruin my reputation. You (develop) the ability to understand that
these things happen, and how to anticipate them and work around
them.”
However, regardless of all of the learning experiences taking
place behind the scenes at UCLARadio.com, listenership is the main
concern. With ticket giveaways, special guests and a new logo,
graduating psycholinguistics student Belinda Cheng hopes that in
the coming years, the station will see a significant increase in
its audience size.
“(I’ve learned) the difficulties of
self-promotion,” Cheng said. “I really hope the UCLA
community will learn to fully appreciate what UCLARadio.com has to
offer and support its efforts. There are a lot of talented DJs that
are not getting enough listeners to keep their shows
alive.”
It is a debated issue as to when, if ever, Internet radio will
generate a greater audience. For now, students will have to aspire
to work at an AM or FM broadcast station somewhere else. As an
Internet-only station, UCLARadio.com lacks the listenership of
rival college radio station KUSC 91.5.
“I don’t know how viable it is, but [in the future]
I’d like to see UCLARadio.com become like USC’s station
and broadcast over a band again,” Lee said.
Successful alumni like Lawrence remain optimistic that
regardless of the station’s format, the benefits of the
experience will prevail for those who stick with it. Aside from the
camaraderie, a tenure at the college level is valuable preparation
for the real world.
“The value of college radio, whether it be Internet radio
or cable radio or whatever the format they’re given, [is]
that the people that are involved in it have fun with it, but also
recognize that this is an opportunity to learn in a way that you
won’t get again,” Lawrence said.
Transitioning from the college life into a career in radio is
competitive, and so the in-depth experience of working at
UCLARadio.com provides an edge for job hunters. At any hour of the
day, barely a handful of students are in charge of the 24-hour
broadcast, and so they have a unique opportunity to try out the
station’s capabilities.
“(It’s important that students) use the experience
of working at the radio station to explore all of the aspects of
it, understand all of the parts of a radio station, how it all fits
together ““ and think about radio as a whole,” said
Lawrence.
As for the future, UCLARadio.com seniors have a lot of different
paths to consider should they choose to continue to explore the
broadcast industry. Some may already have their eyes set on a
prize.
“I figure I’ll start out in radio, but eventually
I’d like to move on to TV,” Lee said.
