by Brian Asare, Photography Editor
WRCM, Manhattan college’s student run radio station, has been around since the 1970s, but due to some major setbacks and lack of personnel, the radio station was forced into dormancy in 2014 and had no signs of coming back until now.
The revival of the WRCM was definitely something that did not happen overnight. Led by sophomore communication major Samantha Walla, WRCM consists of a new team that worked very hard to overcome a number of obstacles that the old team could not overcome with an addition of some new ones as well.
Sophomore Alyssa Tipton is one of WRCM’s newest team members working hard to revive the fallen platform.
“WRCM is aiming to build a community of creative, driven and passionate students that will enrich our campus. WRCM will serve as a unique platform, providing great music and innovative content that promotes diversity, tolerance, and freedom of expression,” she said. “This radio station is meant to be a creative outlet for students to voice their opinions on any topic of interest that may attract other students. Whether it be genres of music, food, campus life, or compilations of different personal experiences, the content of WRCM is made by students to ensure the interests lie within more current and relatable topics students encounter day to day.”
She continued.
“There have been many attempts to restart the station, however the attempts were rendered fruitless due to either lack or support or lack of structure within the organization,” Tipton said. “We’ve decided to restart the radio station now because we believe that the radio is a dying art form that is the perfect medium in which students can creatively voice their opinions on certain topics and current events with a more colloquial and intimate means of doing so. Many students have expressed interest in WRCM, and we believe that with that support as our backbone we can restart the radio station with a more sustainable and efficient approach than all of the other previous attempts.”
Kevin Donald is another of WRCM’s new team member working had to revive the platform.
“The radio station is most basically about providing a platform for students at MC to share their favorite music along with their ideas about the world. We are hoping to really form a community here, hosting concerts and other events on campus,” Donald said.
He continued.
“The station has come and gone a few times over the last couple of decades. We think that putting the station online will revitalize it, and we are hoping that all the excitement we are seeing around this will really keep the fire burning,” he said.
Thom Gencarelli, the founding chair of Manhattan College’s “Next Generation” communication program is the advisor for the radio station.
“I’ve been really really impressed with the core group of people who have spearheaded getting this back off the ground because you’re not going have a radio station that is a campus club without students,” he said.
He also shed some light on some of the obstacles that the new team has had to overcome to make this come back possible.
“We needed equipment and we worked it out beautifully to get the equipment we needed to create an online streaming version of a radio station,” Gencarelli said.
He continued.
“We also needed space and I want to credit Rob Walsh [senior advisor for strategic partnerships]. Rob Walsh has a weekly program on 1010 wins and he is inviting 1010 wins to campus. He is gung ho about radio and gung ho about the fact that the students want to do this and he’s met with the same group of students a number of times and He is bringing in a 10 10 wins sponsored event to campus. It’s going to be about the Bronx on March 13 and suggested to the administration that to keep the momentum going, For this station we should make the space happen and we should have a ribbon cutting ceremony as part of that day. Lo and behold the waters parted the sun came out and we’re going to have a space it is going be ready for this for the station to work very shortly. The station space will be completely renovated in RLC research learning center in the form of security booth in time for that event on March 13,” Gencarelli said.
It looks like after four years of plain white noise and static, the radio station is coming back to life and it is going to be totally controlled by the students of MC.
Programming-wise, the WRCM team are coming up with many promising new ideas that will be sure to keep we the audience intrigued and entertained and we should be able to hear their first broadcast early February this year.
To conclude to those who say radio is dead, Gencarelli had this to say.
“I am a media person. As a media theorist and a media critic, We should not think that radio is doomed, that most people in college stream music on their iPhones and on their computers and don’t listen to the radio at all anymore. Radio in its history has already configured itself once,” he said.
He continued.
“It’s not going away, and it’s not that we are here in Manhattan College practicing radio for people who want to go into the radio business. But we are celebrating radio and its continued existence and the ways in which it is still useful to people, still important to people and still cool,” Gencarelli said.
Edtior’s Note: Samantha Walla is a Production Editor for The Quadrangle.