By Angeline Huang Evans

The media industry has become a 24-hour stream of video, television, radio, web content, and news. Televisions blare in every room of the house, radios provide the backdrop for daily commutes, and computers are small enough to carry from chair to chair. With the changing media comes changing roles for those in the industry. Not surprisingly, the education leading to a career in the industry has also changed.

These changes may not be happening where you’d expect. While a bachelor’s degree is still generally required in the broadcast industry, California Community Colleges give students the chance for hands-on experience before they transfer or get a job.

“For many students it just makes sense to start at community college, and what they’re finding is not only do they get their general education classes at the community college rate, but they can get in the studio right away and start doing production work,” says Michelle Brown, head of the Broadcast and Electronic Media department at the College of San Mateo and former San Francisco State University adjunct faculty member. “In the universities, chances are they don’t really get to do production work until they’re juniors or seniors because there are so many students in the program.”

College of San Mateo also boasts a resource that many four-year universities do not have: a public broadcasting channel studio right on campus.  KCSM, which has been supporting the college’s broadcast programs since the 1960s, has a top-of-the-line studio reserved for student use, enlists about 15 student-interns each semester, and provides an outlet to air exceptional student work.

Student Libby Hook recently finished her second semester at CSM. The experience she’s accumulated in less than a year is impressive.  “In spring semester, we actually put a show on KCSM TV and I was show producer for just about all of the episodes,” says Hook.  “I intern with one of the director/producers at KCSM and I’ve been able to work on some shows and was able to run production assistant on two shows we filmed two weeks ago.” A returning student (Hook has her B.A. in business management from a private four-year school), Hook was also impressed at the resources provided by Brown and other instructors to help students find jobs and internships from the outset.

In addition to broadcast media programs, many colleges are integrating video broadcasts into their campus newspapers. The Journalism Association of Community Colleges (JACC) is a nonprofit that supports journalism programs through conferences and award opportunities. While the organization is generally print-centric, it is finding that the trend toward multimedia, video, and web content is bridging the gap between formerly separate departments.

“Nearly all of the newspapers and publications in the state at two-year schools have website components,” says JACC President Jay Seidel, a journalism professor at Fullerton College. “In addition to that, on the broadcasting side, broadcast departments have been embracing the web, streaming radio, doing online sportscasting or broadcasting, or deejaying through various websites. That seems to be a reflection of the profession, and it’s something two-year schools in California have been working to embrace more and more.”

While traditional media outlets continue to evolve, community colleges are combining areas of study and resources to provide a well-rounded foundation on which students can build upon.

“One thing that hasn’t changed at all is the fact that media is a powerful way to tell a story, to inform, and to start change in a society,” says Brown, the CSM professor. “With everything happening around us—standard definition, high definition, equipment changes—what’s still most important is to keep the students able to tell stories. We give them the tools so they can make their voice heard.”