PC Reinstitutes WPCX Radio Station

PC+Reinstitutes+WPCX+Radio+Station

Denise Devaney, Editor-in-Chief

Thanks to a few fellow students, PC has revamped their radio station, WPCX. According to Doug Wallace, students had lost interest in student media for a period of time, “WPCX was shut down for a number of years simply due to a lack of student interest. This was just a shift across all student media platforms at the time, and WPCX suffered the most. The station was in need of some upgrades and maintenance, and with the lack of interest, we decided to shut it down.” Thanks to Jerius Duncan, WPCX has come back to air for Clinton and PC. “Now WPCX is more of a radio station with talk shows and music. We revamped and revived it to be more sustainable,” says Wallace.

Reeves Bridges and Nick Young have already aired a classic rock shows. “We are also in the process of developing new shows which will be starting very soon.” They also worked with Wallace to reduce audio interference and load a wide variety of music onto the station before WPCX went live on the 15.

The radio station received all of their licenses on September 10. There will also be a training session for those interested in being on the air. “The station will run talk shows from 7 AM to 12 midnight with music running in between for 24 hours,” says Duncan, who eventually hopes to open access when the Media Center is closed.

As a student who struggles to make a dime, I asked Duncan if hosts could get paid, “As of right now, no. Maybe in the future, and possibly next semester, that is the goal. It is out of my control and depends on the Student Media Services and the Russell Program Committee. We hope to count it as class credit so there is accountability.” The station cannot make any promises about salary or class credit, but they will try and get approval for one or the other.

WPCX airs currently in Clinton and will soon reach Laurens, Greenwood and Spartanburg county, but if you would like to listen in to the station when you are not in range, you can listen off of the Radio FX app, “Anyone in the world can listen to WPCX from that app. Listening from the app would be the easiest way to access the channel instead of turning a radio on to the station.” The app can track who is listening and what tracks they prefer. Listeners can also find WPCX on 97.1 FM and the station can be found in the Media center in the basement of the library.

Duncan, Lance Harvey and Zoe Montague had the idea of reviving the station. They were listening to the broadcasters during the Super Bowl when Duncan brought up the idea of hosting a radio station. They worked together to find out everything they could about WPCX to get it going again. “Eventually, we asked Wallace about WPCX, and he had all of the information we needed,” says Duncan. Wallace will serve as advisor for the student media organization.

I then wondered if there was a limit to what could be aired, “Yes, PC has to be cool with what’s aired, and Wallace will also help limit what goes on air. There’s not a lot of limits to what’s aired, but there are obvious limits like cursing.”

Duncan and WPCX are still looking for hosts to fill air time, “We have blocks like a 7-10 show, 11-1, 2-4 and 5-9. Two shows could air in those blocks, and we would like to have someone in those spots every day.”

WPCX does not have specific content in mind to air, “We just want something interesting and/or beneficial to the campus and the community. We also want to air content that PC and Clinton would want to listen to.” So far, WPCX has only two shows a day, so if you are interested in filling in air time, contact Jerius Duncan: [email protected].