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I attended my first CHSR meeting tonight. Even though there were only twelve other members present, it helped me gain a better understanding of the issues facing the radio station. As seems to be the case with many university and community radio stations, CHSR has gone through "booms and slumps" over the years. Right now seems to be a slump. While the program schedule is nearly full and therefore many of the broadcasts are live, the station seems to be lacking a sense of community among it's members. This is, in part, evidenced by a low turnout at meetings. Also, it seems that many people both in the community and on campus have no idea that the station exists. To me, it's particularly distressing that students aren't aware of the opportunities the station provides, both in its programming and in its willingness to take on new members. It seems that many people have little faith in and/or low expectations of radio (with good reason...commercial radio, especially in rural Canada, is quite bland), and would prefer to be entertained by iPods, iTunes, or CDs.
So, despite these difficulties, being a member of CHSR right now is very exciting. There were some really interesting people at the meeting tonight who had a lot of good ideas on how we can reinvigorate CHSR as well as renew our connection with the outside community. One idea was a series of live broadcasts, from places like the farmers' market, bookstores, shopping malls, coffeeshops campus events, bars, public high schools, etc. Another suggestion was that we have a series of "kitchen parties", timeslots when local musicians can get together and play in the studio for a live broadcast. I'd actually like to incorporate live performances into my show next year, perhaps do a "World Cafe" type thing where half of the show is an assortment of new music and the other half features a live performance/interview with a local artist. Speaking of my show, I've only got something like three weeks before it's over for the summer!
I've also decided to do an honours in English, major in Great Ideas, and minor in Spanish. I was thinking the other day, and realized that writing and reading have always been areas of strength and enjoyment for me, where as the scientific process has never been. Sociology is fucking irritating. When I'm telling people about what I've been doing at university, the only exciting things I have to say are ones that relate to English, philosophy, or Chinese. So, I'm thinking that I'd like to get a masters in English, probably from a Canadian university.
Speaking of English and Spanish, I somehow managed to place third in the 1st Annual University Of New Brunswick Speech Contest. The guy who lived in Beijing for two years took first place, and a Japanese girl who wrote a damn good speech came in second. It was a really great experience, and a good way to end the year and affirm that yes, I have the ability to speak a fair amount of Chinese.
Today was beautiful. My roommate was home with mono all last week and part of the week before, and his mother gave him money to buy healthy food. So, he and I went up to the supermarket today and got some fruits, veggies, and generally nourishing food to help him regain some strength. Man, he lost a lot of weight while he was sick...mono must suck! Anyway, there wasn't a cloud in the sky and the temperature was somewhere around 50 degrees. We also had one of our Aquinas classes outside today. Rather than simply walking into the building and sitting down in the classroom, every person in the class sat in the courtyard in front of the building. Eventually, Prof. Wilkie came outside and beckoned for us to follow him. He took us on a walk along a path behind campus, which goes through a little patch of woods where people go when they want to smoke drugs at night. Anyway, we found a quiet, spacious clearing and had our class there. Being outdoors afforded quite a few funny moments. At one point, Wilkie was chasing one of the students through the forest with a huge stick, then he threw his copy of Frankenstein at him. So, good times all around!!
Looks like I'm outta here sometime around April 10th, and hopefully start work at Maine Made soon after.