ktru has a full-time, professional general manager to act in an administrative role. this is a copy of the letter we wrote to the thresher, rice university's student newspaper, concerning the new position.
To the editor:
There has been a lot of speculation and confusion in the past year or so about possible changes ocurring here at KTRU. Various rumors have been floating around the Houston community about university crack- downs, corporate takeovers, and massive programming changes. We are writing to set the record straight.
KTRU (pronounced "kay-true") 91.7 FM is the student-run radio station of Rice University. As a noncommercial educational station with a signal that covers one of the nation's largest cities, we are in a unique position to provide Greater Houston with underexposed musics and ideas not available form the mainstream media. Created by students in the early 70's, KTRU has gradually grown over the years from a humble on- campus carrier current through a variety of different incarnations to the 50,000 watt FM station that it is today. Through all of its 27 years, KTRU has been entirely managed and operated by the students of Rice University with minimal intervention from either the faculty or administration.
Certain aspects of KTRU's operations, however, are in the process of change. In May of 1996, the the president of Rice University, Malcolm Gillis, formed a committee to reassess KTRU's position within the university. The committee, which included two KTRU staff members and other members of the Rice community, issued its recommendations at the end of the 1997 spring semester. One of these recommendations was to hire a full-time professional General Manager to serve as an advisor to the students at KTRU and as a liason between the students and the rest of the university. In late May of 1997, another university-wide committee, which also included two KTRU staff members, was formed to search for someone to fill this newly-created position. On July 1, 1998, Will Robedee of New Paltz, NY will become the first professional General Manager of KTRU.
We believe that this new position will allow us to broaden and enrich KTRU's programming. As full-time university students with exceedingly heavy work loads, KTRU's volunteer staff has always been limited in what it can accomplish. Hopefully, by shifting the day to day tasks involved in running a radio station (such as FCC compliance and DJ management) onto a full-time administrator, the students will be able to focus on what really counts: our programming. Most of what KTRU broadcasts is music, but we would also like to include news, community events, and lectures and concerts given on campus. We are also looking forward to increased collaboration with community organizations like DiverseWorks and MECA.
On the other hand, we fear that the new General Manager position is just the first of a long series of attempts by the university administration to gradually take KTRU out of the students' hands. We understand that this is an extreme situation, but we also recognize that it is a real possibility. What we are more worried about is that, as generations of students come and go, the General Manager position may gradually- albeit with the best of intentions- come to dominate the station's operation, until one day KTRU will no longer be truly student-run.
While we are aware of the potential dangers involved in hiring a professional General Manager, we believe that the changes occurring at KTRU are for the best. We are confident that these changes will allow us to expand the scope of KTRU's activities without significantly changing its essential character and while allowing it to remain a radio station run by the students of Rice University.
Heather Colvin
Station Manager, KTRU
Sid Richardson '00
Kevin Knight
Jazz Director, KTRU
Will Rice '98
Maggie Large
Music Director, KTRU
Hanszen '98
jeff smith
Music Director Emeritus, KTRU
Brown '97
some other stuff relating to the whole general manager affair:
an article by the rice news concerning the
general manager position.
articles by the
thresher
and the
rice news
concerning the report of the ktru committee.
