Radio Camp for Kids and Teens at Community Radio Station KXCI

How cool is this, if you're a kid or teen in Arizona you can sign up for "Radio Camp" at community radio station KXCI 91.3 FM this summer. The week-long day camp teaches kid the ins and outs of radio broadcasting and culminates in the group running their own radio show.

If you're a radio-obsessed kid in Tucson, the teen class (week of June 23rd) has a few more slots and there's also a kid class (for 9-12 year olds) in August.

I love it when college and community radio stations encourage kids and teens to get involved. I've been at stations with high school student DJs and I'm always super impressed when kids that young are interested in radio.

Do you have kids and teens at your station? Do you think you'd ever host a summer camp?

BonBlogs Radio History: Childhood Record Spinning to College Radio to Music Biz

This piece by Bonnie Gillespie on her blog BonBlogs really spoke to my own nostalgia about the role that music has played in my life since early childhood. She posts an adorable picture of herself as a toddler creating the perfect music mix with her record player and vinyl records. She'd later go on to DJ at college radio station WUOG-FM in Athens, Georgia in the late 1980s and mid 1990s. She writes:

"I worked in college radio. Yup. WUOG, 90.5fm. Athens, Georgia's college radio in the late '80s (REM, Pylon, Love Tractor, B-52s) and then again in the mid-90s. I started out as a jock (working the midnight to 3am shift on Monday mornings), eventually scored a 'lunchbox' shift, then became the host of 'Blank Generation' on Friday nights. As an undergrad, I became the station's Promotions Director, and when I came back to UGA for grad school, I was named the Graduate Advisor to the station. That was awesome. Getting paid to do something I would do for free? Badass."

In talking about her childhood beginnings she writes:

"I would 'play DJ' when I was a toddler, then I would create mix tapes for friends in high school that would become 'requested' by other friends and friends of friends until I had a little side gig of creating mixes for dozens at a time."

It's funny, because it's only as an adult looking back that I realize the significance of a few things from my childhood in terms of my music trajectory. When I was 5 years old I got a tape recorder for Christmas and used it for many radio-related experiments. My sister and I would record mock radio shows on the bright red cassette recorder, imitating things we'd heard on Dr. Demento. And then, in 6th grade, my dad and I made a Jukebox costume for me to wear on Halloween (I got the idea from Dynamite magazine). I crafted my own mix tape of 1950s rock and roll that I taped off my mom's old records, which I later played when people deposited candy into the jukebox. Should it have been a big surprise that I'd go into college radio (where we kind of hope we're not just thought of as human jukeboxes) and never leave?

Did you play DJ when you were a little kid? What are your favorite childhood music memories?

Future College Radio DJs at Elementary School Station

I was always impressed when I heard about high schools that had their own radio stations, so I'm even more excited to read in yesterday's Charlotte Observer that there's an elementary school in Charlotte, North Carolina that's inviting 5th graders to DJ and program their own station. According to the article:

"Mira is one of five Sandy Ridge Elementary fifth-graders who manage and produce Ram Radio. Officials say it's the only student-run radio station in Union County schools. The kids get together daily to write and record shows, which air twice a day for 30 minutes before and after school. Some 350 families who drive kids to school can tune in as they line up in front of campus. The show, broadcast over 103.3 FM at a low frequency, can be heard 500 feet away. It doesn't air during class time. Ram Radio is part of principal Tom Childers' push 'to implement 21st-century technology skills' in elementary grades."

This is great that they actually see radio as a "21st-century technology skill" as even some colleges do not. Sandy Ridge Elementary has archived some shows on their website if you're interested in hearing these young DJs.