February 16, 1983
The End of an Era at WAER
A new station manager,
a new image and a loss of
student control at SU's FM station
By Mike Greenstein
Say good-bye to WAER at least as listeners currently know it.
The Syracuse University radio station's
programming format will change on Monday, April 4. While
specifics of the new format have yet to be finalized and approved
by the SU administration, WAER programming will be vastly unlike
that which is now offered.
For the first time in its 36-year history, a professional Motion manager will determine FM88’s programming policy. In the past, students acting alone or in concert with faculty advisors have made that decision. In the new WAER format the emphasis will be on news and information instead of music. And, regardless of what kind of music the station manager decides will be played between those news and information segments, a narrower selection of music will be played on WAER, and individual disc Jockeys will have less control over selecting it.
Station manager David Anderson anticipates making that musical format decision within the next two weeks and then presenting it to the SU administration for approval. He will most likely select one of the three categories of music WAER now plays—jazz, urban contemporary and new rock—as the station's primary musical format. In order to satisfy the many interested political forces, however, he is prepared to accept into his new format a secondary musical style and at least some of the special-interest programs WAER now carries, like the gospel and Caribbean shows. And he now says he will also give "serious consideration" to a tightly dictated blend of those styles, which the student staff proposed as a compromise last week.
Anderson contends an increased emphasis on news and information, with one consistent type of music filling the time in between, is the most logical way to increase the size of WAER's listenership. Depending on which interpretation of statistical information is used, WAER currently ranks at or near the bottom of audience popularity among the 23 radio stations in the Syracuse area.
Whose Format?
WAER's student staff has accepted Anderson's contention that the station's on-the-air consistency, audience size and fiscal responsibility must improve. But while they also accept in principle the need for a professional station manager, they question not only Anderson's impending decision, but also his unilateral power to make it.
Still, in an effort to reach a middle ground and preserve some semblance of the current musical variety they cherish, the staff has united unanimously (with a few abstentions) behind the musical formula they presented last week.
The staff proposal includes a studious mix of news, features and the call-in show Coffee Break in the morning, jazz and mellow rhythm'n'blues during the midday hours and what the staff calls the "Sound of the 80s''—an intelligent, partially pre-selected blend of new rock, urban contemporary, dance music, roots rock'n'roll, blues and reggae—for the rest of the programming day. A one-day trial of the proposed staff format will air for 18 hours this Friday, Feb. 18. for Anderson's and the staff's evaluation.
Unless Anderson adopts the students' format, protests of some sort are likely from those disenfranchised.
Realistically, however, any protest by staff members, student groups, listeners or citizens' groups will have little effect on programming policy. Fruitless listener protests about programming changes at WRVR in New York City, WHFS in Washington, D.C. and even at WONO and WCNY here in Syracuse, are just a few examples of the ineffectiveness of this type of public outcry. Further, many universities recently have taken control of or closed down student-run stations.
At SU, student control of WAER has been fading steadily since the late Seventies. And since selecting Anderson as WAER's second manager last August, the university has (by its usual snail-like standards) been sprinting in that direction.
In fact, if then-finalist Anderson had gotten the job when SU hired James Hardy for the post in July 1980, the proposed format changes would be fait accompli by now. Hardy, because of his broadcasting philosophy and personality clashes with students, actually delayed things for a while. Anderson, who took over in late September 1982 after a successful stint as general manager of the public radio, university-owned station in Tulsa, Okla. has been trying to make up for lost time. And the SU administration, whose waffling hindered Hardy's ability to assert authority and speeded his departure, is giving its steadfast and confident mandate to his successor.
That kind of support probably eliminates the WAER staff's last opportunity for retaining control of the station's programming. For, in contrast to their battles with Hardy, the current conflict at WAER is one of principles, not personalities. And while most staff members don't agree with Anderson's programming ideas, few can question that they are sound, and none question his ability to administrate a public radio station.
When Anderson replaced Hardy, the university traded up for a highly opinionated, knowledgeable, efficient and straightforward administrator with a more feasible plan for improvement. Hardy tried to pacify everybody, and wound up getting burned at both ends. Anderson, on the other hand, has been up-front and direct about everything, from his interviews onward. Neither adminstration nor staff get any shenanigans from Anderson: He has a plan for the station and he's a self-described "hard-ass" when it comes to getting it into practice.
That program, if it succeeds, will bring financial stability and professional standards to WAER by seeking a larger, older, more affluent and more homogeneous audience. In many ways, it represents a university about-face from the orientation envisioned during Hardy's tenure.
Hardy's original plan for WAER's future emphasized diversity of service. He wanted WAER's programming to cater to even more special-interest and minority groups, and wanted the station to try to qualify for funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. His plan encountered not only student opposition, but also administrative resistance based on finances—the staffing CPB funding would have required even more university spending.
Anderson, however, came in talking SU's language—money. Rich, white, private, professional money. Anderson's master plan promises to improve WAER's quality, raise its credibility and more than double its annual budget within five years—all at no additional cost to the university. He proposes to do this by first changing the format and then using it to raise money through a combination of foundation grants, corporate donations and direct, on-the-air fundraising appeals. He plans the first for October, with a "reasonable goal of $10,000."
More money is definitely needed to support the non-commercial station. Syracuse University now spends $106,000 a year on WAER. Even at that figure, the station had to implement drastic cost-cutting measures (like taking out most of the station's phone lines and dropping the UPI Audio Network news reports) to get through the current fiscal year. "For $106,000, the university would like to have some consistency and responsibility in the station's bookeeping and programming," Anderson explained. Quite clearly, the days of all-night zaniness, weird music and experimental radio on WAER are over.
To accomplish that without the start-up costs vying for Corporation for Public Broadcasting funding would entail necessitates boosting the size and median age of WAER’s audience. Students, blacks and various factions of the music industry may like WAER's current programming mix, but they're not going to pay to support it. Better news coverage and a tighter, more sophisticated music format can attract a larger, more affluent audience—or so the administrative reasoning goes.
"I was hired to get the station to the point where it's not in constant turmoil," Anderson explained, assessing his role there. "I'm going to take it through its next growth stage. Right now, it's at a plateau—the university's feeling is that it's gone as far as it can go with a student staff. The station as it is now programmed is not packaged for listeners—it's packaged for its workers. The university's presumption is that the station is there to serve the entire community. We're not doing that—we're serving only small pockets."
Admittedly, Anderson is after higher ratings for WAER, trying to broaden its audience appeal to generate more dollars. But the objective, he stresses, is not to make money, but to make a better radio station.
"Our goal should be-to service as many people as possible, while acknowledging that we cannot service everyone, nor should we try," Anderson explained. "As a non-commercial broadcaster we are in a luxurious position, but we won't take that luxury too far. We're last now because we're not providing a service."
To improve that service, Anderson wants to install a primary musical format consistent enough to not drive listeners away between the news and information segments. Although he professes to like music, it will clearly be a secondary feature on his new WAER format. In order to help develop student talent and expertise in the news and public affairs areas, Anderson proposes hiring a news director as the next full-time, paid professional WAER staff member, with the student news director becoming an assistant. Anderson also proposes dismantling the current evening public affairs bloc, dividing its features into shorter segments programmed throughout the day.
Student Dissatisfaction
At a commercial radio station, of course if ownership decided to bring in new management and change its programming policy, any staff dissent would normally be contained as an internal matter. At WAER however, because of its unique market position as a non-commercial, student-staffed station, dissatisfaction is widespread and widely broadcast. With a 36-year tradition of programming independence, of alumni sprinkled liberally throughout the music, news and sports aspects of broadcasting, and with widespread industry recognition as one of the best, most professional college radio stations in the country, the current WAER personnel— representing staff interests of yesterday, today and tomorrow—is not about to let Anderson and the university steamroll its program though.
"I can't blame the students for not wanting a format change, but I must do what is best for the station, the university and the students," Anderson acknowledged in a statement to a Newhouse School of Public Communications newsletter. "Here, a student can learn how to package himself for a professional station which uses one format. We want to teach students how to be part of the broadcasting industry within the industry standard. "
Students disagree. They dispute Anderson's audience figures, question the applicability of his programming ideas for their station, maintain he is quashing cultural diversity and student creativity, and charge he is ignoring a recently completed document entitled Recommendations of the Chancellor's Ad Hoc Committee on WAER. The report, a product of the procedural crisis caused by former station manager Hardy's firing of two student staff members in August 1981, took an 11-member panel of students, faculty and administrators more than a year to draft.
"Anderson is right—but not for this station," WAER music director Eric Arnum contends. "He doesn't know this market, he doesn't know this community and he doesn't know our listeners. The WAER audience— college students, minorities and young people—don't show up well in ratings. He's giving false meaning to the ratings figures."
The discussions Anderson instituted have made the students realize the station does have a problem, however. "Our problem is lack of predictability," Arnum says. "The way we program WAER right now has too much switching back and forth. The audience doesn't understand how and when the formats switch."
The WAER staff hopes the musical format that will air Friday will satisfy Anderson's demand for consistency but still allow students to fulfill their-need for creativity and diverse musical programming. "There's no need to play just one kind of music," Arnum maintains. "Our format would be consistent, yet diverse. It's an upbeat colorblind format, a general sound that can appeal to blacks and whites all day. It's not rock, it's not urban contemporary, it's not jazz; it's a cross between them."
Staff Proposal
The staff's proposed programming format would have news and short public affairs features from 5 a.m. to 9 a.m., followed by the one-hour call-in show Coffee Break. From 10 a.m. until 2 p.m., the programming would be jazz—modern, traditional and vocal jazz, including some mellow rhythm 'n' blues material by artists like Al Jarreau, Randy Crawford or Donald Fagen. From 2 to 4 p.m. would be a strictly formatted transition period that would include some jazz, blues, reggae and even some new music. During that period, virtually every song played would be pre-selected by the music director for adherence to the desired flow of music.
After 4 p.m., the full-fledged "Sound of the 80s" would begin, with disc jockeys given a choice of albums to play within several distinct categories—new music current r'n'b and older material selected for its adherence to the format and transitional capabilities.
The proposed format would also increase the amount of news and information on WAER from its present three hours a day to five initially, Arnum said. More would be worked in as the staffs capability to produce it increased.
As a rationale for objecting to Anderson's one-music format plan, student staffers cite repeated past references from Chancellor Melvin Eggers, Eickmann and other university administrators that WAER should be even more diverse.
Anderson and Eickmann now say, however, that putting the station's emphasis on news and information will itself increase its overall diversity. Plenty of room for diversity will remain within whatever musical format is selected, they claim.
"I don't see Dave's statement as ruling out a diversity of music," Eickmann explained in an interview last week. "Dave is only saying the station has to have an identity. Within the two main features of the format—the news and the music—there will be diversity." "In terms of ideas, we'll be more diverse," adds Anderson.
The same kind of word games are being played with student charges that the creative, experimental aspect of college radio will be stifled under Anderson's proposed changes. "Creativity is an overused word," responds the station manager. "There's just a difference in our definitions. I believe in developing creativity by encouraging standards. Adhering to standards inspires creativity. Students will be forced to have a rationale for what they do."
"Who determines which semantic prevails?" asked Coffee Break host Don Rully, one of four student members of the Chancellor's Ad Hoc Committee on WAER. "I know it’s not going to be the students."
Rully, who admitted "the whole (committee) process discouraged me," feels the committee's report has been "totally disregarded." A draft of the committee's recommendations, completed in December wasn't circulated to committee members for corrections until the end of January. Those are now being incorporated into the final document, which has yet to be presented to Eggers, more than a year after he was originally supposed to get it. Although none of it has been adopted as official policy, Eickmann and Anderson maintain "the parts that need to be operating are operating."
Rully and other WAER staff members, however, see things differently. "The report was drafted, and then Anderson got the right of perusal," he explained. "He decided he didn't like the selection process for student program director and senior staff, so he changed it so he would have final say. Students are relegated to an advisory role.
Loss of Student Control
And that, in a nutshell, is the difference between the Sixties, when WAER first spread its wings under student control, and the Eighties, when student power has all but dissipated and administrative victory is inevitable.
At least SU could try to let the students lose with dignity. The most prudent and humanistic decision Anderson and the university could make now would be to accept the student staff's well-intentioned and practical proposal. Try it for a while, anyway. As musical director Arnum says, "If Anderson reaches a compromise with us, he'll still get continuity and a better radio station—not just for college students, but for people who can appreciate the ideas that come out of here. We are a college station—they must accept what we are."
Even if the proposed "Sound of the 80s" format doesn't increase the station's audience and help fundraising, Anderson can always re-evaluate it in a year—as he says he will do with any musical format he chooses—and alter if further. Such a solution would postpone and minimize the credibility of any protests and give him more time to surround himself with more loyal followers. And if the students' plan works out, he can rationalize it by explaining he's inspired them to intellectualize the process of radio programming, to act more professionally on the air, and to accept his authority.
"Students will lose decision-making power, but the gains to students educationally, and to the station, far outweigh that, " he says. "We have a responsibility to educate students here as well as the public. We want people here who want to go into broadcasting—who want to be professionals working for WAER. And it's unprofessional to be wedded to a particular format. They must learn to wed themselves to the business. We must train them to be better equipped to face situations they'll find in the industry.
"WAER should be an intense learning experience. You can no longer come in here and do your own thing. You can't just come in here and play."
Whatever format WAER ends up with, an era of its history will be over. It will still be a college radio station, but it will never again be the freewheeling cultural phenomenon it has been to its staff, to college students and to Central New Yorkers who can appreciate radio that's out of the ordinary every once in a while.
WAER may even become a better radio station. But it's never going to be as much fun.
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Last Modified October 14, 2005 |