WRVU Reduces Number of Non-Student DJs

Well, I just got word that Vanderbilt University station WRVU is another college radio station that has recently decided to limit the number of community DJs on their airwaves. According to an article in the Tennessean last week,

"The Vanderbilt Student Communications board voted in November to limit the number of disc jockeys on the station who are not directly affiliated with the university, cutting the number from roughly 50 to 25. Over the past week, many of them have signed off. Chris Carroll, director of student media, said the cap was necessary because there were too many 'community' DJs on the airwaves, and managing all of them had gotten difficult for the station's student staff. 'There was a loose belief that anyone who had an interest in radio had an opportunity to come have a show,' he said. 'That was not what was ever intended.'"

On The Nashville Scene blog there's a list of the shows being eliminated and saved at WRVU.

This is quite similar to the new policy implemented at WITR (which by the way has inspired its own protest group on Facebook). As others have pointed out, it will be interesting to see if there are enough students willing to fill the open shifts.

Although it's important to make room for student DJs, I know that most stations struggle to get enough DJs to fill all of the open shifts. The growing trend is to air automated programming when shifts aren't covered. Hopefully these stations will still keep an open mind about utilizing community members for difficult to fill shifts.