community media
Show me your publics, and I’ll show you mine
Reading the title chapter of Michael Warner’s 2002 collection of essays Publics and Counterpublics, I am struck by how the book resonates with my work with the Transmission Project. It has helped me think through and beyond the rhetoric I encounter every day.
Communications
Organization:
119 Gallery VISTA Name:
Mira Allen
Program Start:
7/2008
Program End:
7/2009
Project Description:
119 Gallery seeks an individual to lead the expansion and development of the organization’s marketing, outreach and community building activities so we can reach and serve a larger population. Utilizing multiple communication venues, we will develop a solid strategic communications plan to inform our community members of offerings and engage them in programming. The Gallery’s robust programs of events, education, and exhibits draw a steady crowd of artists, community members, and young people. It has a number of systems (both operational and technical) in place to handle the strategic communications of the organization, but they are fragmented and lack focus. The CTC VISTA member would design and create a cohesive system that will more effectively leverage the organizations skills and capacities to engage and educate our community members.
· Assess organization’s current outreach, marketing and communication activities with strategic communications in mind
· Assess organization’s current communication infrastructure (web, email, social networks, print, mail, press)
· Gather member input into strategic communication needs
· Establish networking and outreach and shared communications with collaborating organizations.
· Research and recommend new processes for integrating and redesiging in a more efficient and strategic manner the organization’s outreach, marketing and communications activities with an eye toward greater community impact and involvement
· Design and implement this new strategic communications plan
· Create a set of evaluation metrics and benchmarks that will enable the organization to track is progress
· Train interns, volunteers and staff in the effective use of and maintainence of the new communications system
· Provide additional strategic input and staffing support for all gallery programmatic areas, including Identifying and meeting with community organizations that share our mission and constituency.
Project Outcome:
Mira has succeeded in organizing our overall marketing. She is working with a volunteer from the the Jericho Road Foundation to establish a comprhensive marketing plan. She is a member of the 199 Gallery Board’s Marketing Subcommittee. She maintains Facebook and Myspace pages, posting notices and invites as appropriate. She edits and emails a bimonthly newsletter using Constant Contact. She has participated in the design and development of several fund raising events including the Jazz Brunch, and Dinner & A Movie. She organized the annual membership renewal campaign, Show Us The Love. She has updated the gallery database. She assists in recruiting and managing volunteers.
The database was a mess, Mira fixed it! She created the newsletter from scratch and in addition has established a good working relationship with the local newspaper, the Lowell SUN.
Mira helped us with press release, created a social networking site which has over 500 fans, worked on our monthly newsletter and multiple fundraisers.
In addition, Mira joined several community projects, sent out a marketing survey to Gallery members, and, over Labor Day weekend, participated in the Bumpkin Island Artists Encampment over Labor Day Weekend. She also coordinated the Jazz Brunch, our annual fundraiser.
We did not get the completed manual for future training, but as a result of Mira’s work, we have much more visibility and are growing in terms of members and programming.
Impact Quote:
“Mira was devoted even outside the job, she harnessed many relationships for the gallery that otherwise would not have been here. As a result we got more people interested in our gallery and diverse programming.”
- Y Sok Woodward, supervisor
KNON Community Radio
Website:
http://www.knon.org/ Location:
Dallas, TX
KNON is a non-profit, listener-supported radio station, deriving its main source of income from on-air pledge drives and from underwriting or sponsorships by local small businesses.
KNON went on air on August 6, 1983 with 10,000 watts of power. In March 1990, KNON raised it’s power to 55,000 watts. The signal covers a radius of approximately 60 miles from Cedar Hill. it extends from Mckinney, Hillsboro, Corsicana and from Ft. Worth to Greenville.
KNON is on the air 24 hours, seven days a week, with the most diverse programming in Texas. The volunteer disc jockeys play their own music or conduct talk shows during specifically targeted programs. The program variety can be seen on our schedule.
Each music format has its own unique demography, but the one thing that the entire KNON audience shares is that they listen to KNON, rather that use it for background noise.
KONZ Internet Radio Developer
Organization:
UFM Community Learning Center VISTA Name:
Megan Andrews
Program Start:
9/2010
Program End:
9/2011
Project Description:
The Corps member will develop and implement an online community radio station for the Manhattan, Kansas area called KONZ Internet Radio. The VISTA will help with fundraising, public awareness and education about the online station and what it can offer, oversee equipment purchases as well as beginning the process of recruiting and training volunteers to staff the station. The Corps member will create the foundation for future sustainability by helping provide the energy and the necessary day-to-day work.
Outreach Coordinator
Organization:
WERU-FM Community Radio VISTA Name:
Meaghan Lasala
Program Start:
9/2010
Program End:
9/2011
Project Description:
The Corps member will serve in a vital outreach and engagement role that is necessary to boost community engagement work in our new broadcast service area. The Corps member will also serve as a liaison between the radio station and the community during this critical time of community engagement.
WERU-FM Community Radio
Website:
http://weru.org/ Location:
East Orland, ME
to provide a community-based, noncommercial radio service for the people living in the areas covered by the station’s signal; to broadcast programs designed to serve the needs of those not currently served by other broadcast media; to be a voice of many voices offering a wide variety of people an opportunity to share their experiences, concerns, and perspectives with their neighbors over the WERU airwaves.
Citizen Press Corps Project Developer
Organization:
Shires Media Partnership, Inc. VISTA Name:
Brooke Brown-Saracino
Program Start:
9/2010
Program End:
9/2011
Project Description:
The Corps member will help Shires Media Partners develop a Citizen Press Corps, a cadre of citizen journalists who will be trained to use digital technology to gather news not covered in other media in the community, making WBTN-AM a multi-media community information hub. The Corps member will develop a collaborative website where the citizen journalists will post and share their work, from which Shires Media Partnership will select posts for further refinement, broadcast, and distribution.
GreenBlueGray Project Developer
Organization:
Reclaim the Media VISTA Name:
Amber Cortes
Program Start:
9/2010
Project Description:
Our VISTA will help to launch a new hybrid radio/web media project serving high-quality news and features to community radio audiences in the Seattle area. The VISTA will help design and support a project workflow for recruiting news and information providers, organizing news producers, and preparing content for publication. The VISTA will help recruit and coordinate volunteer radio and media producers from regional community radio stations to host and produce programming. The associate will help create and maintain relationships with partnering media outlets, help maintain a project website, and help deepen network relationships among innovate grassroots, community and ethnic media outlets in the Northwest
The VISTA will also work with the project manager and RTM to conduct outreach to participating news outlets looking for weekly/daily news to feature, to maintain the project website, and the conduct community outreach to help promote the project.
Transmission Project/Digital Arts Service Corps
Website:
http://transmissionproject.org/ Location:
Boston, MA
The Transmission Project amplifies the power of public media and technology.
Our vision is a robust and diverse media ecology enabling a world built upon the full participation of society.
For nearly ten years, we have worked to build the capacity of nonprofit organizations that use media and technology to strengthen communities. The Transmission Project fulfills its mission by supporting a diverse network of partner organizations that provide services to benefit communities nationwide.
Our primary initiative is the Digital Arts Service Corps. The Transmission Project builds the strength and community impact of partner organizations such as low-power radio stations, media arts centers, rural broadband initiatives, and media reform policy advocates by supporting specific capacity-building projects through the recruitment and placement of a full-time, on-site AmeriCorps*vista member.
Somerville Community Access Television
Website:
http://access-scat.org/ Location:
Somerville, MA
Somerville Community Access Television is a leading public access media center that enables a vibrant and diverse community to express its creativity, explain its ideas, share its cultures, and foster the individual’s right to freedom of speech. SCAT supports and creates community-driven media through education, production resources, and distribution on cable television and the Web.