By Laura Trethewey
At the Strathcona Farmers’ Market off Edmonton’s Whyte Avenue, I meet two volunteers from CJSR 88.5 FM, which is the University of Alberta’s campus radio station. After a mere 24 hours in Edmonton, I’ve heard a few people praise the station for its diverse programming and alternative news coverage. I was sure there was a brain running the show, and it turns out to belong to news director Samantha Power. Volunteers at the farmers’ market slip me her card.
VITALS: Samantha Power, news director, CJSR Radio, Edmonton
What does a radio news director do?
The station has a mandate to report on alternative, under-represented, marginalized and local communities. I train the news volunteers to do all the reporting, editing and production work themselves. I ensure that we’re covering a wide variety of issues: environmental, queer, feminist, arts, culture and politics. I also work with campus stations across the country and exchange local stories with them. On Fridays, I co-host a heavy metal music program and a news round up.
Do newbies expect to just grab a mic and start talking?
People sometimes come through the door and don’t understand that our volunteers create the whole story from beginning to end. They listen to the CBC and think “Yeah, I can do that,” but don’t realize that there may be five people working on one piece. A bigger challenge is training people in proper research skills and story collection. I feel a lot of responsibility to the community to report stories that represent what’s happening. And I feel responsibility to the volunteers, too. I want them to feel empowered covering that story.
How did you snag the only paying job at CJSR?
I’ll graduate next April with a BA. in political science and creative writing. I’ve always had a full-time job while I was getting my degree, so I can only do one course per semester. That’s put a real delay on my studies; I started in 2001. I volunteered for CJSR for five years and, during that time, I was also the vice-president, external relations and then the president for the student union. I got to know a lot of union organizers and political groups in the community; now I can direct volunteer reporters to the right reps.
What do you want to accomplish before you leave the CJSR’s World Domination Headquarters (aka the Students’ Union Building) for good?
One goal is to set research guidelines for the news department. Community radio stations are often the last bastion of independent reporting, and 2010 is going to be an important year for Canada with the G8 Summit and the Winter Olympics. I don’t think community stations should ever try to compete with mainstream media – they should stick with their communities – but there will be huge opportunities for alternative reporting in the coming year. U
Laura Trethewey is riding the train from Toronto to Vancouver and meeting regular Canadians along the way for our Job Training series. Every city she stops in she’ll ask one regular person about what they do for a living. Unlimited is posting the conversations on our interactive map.
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[...] first met Samantha Power in 2005. Or maybe it was 2006. I remember sitting in a living room a few blocks from campus, [...]