The 2017 Community Media Conference schedule is out, and is already adding more speakers and sessions.
The agenda for NFCB’s annual community radio gathering was released Wednesday. Since the rollout, we’ve added a range of speakers, including:
- Kate Krosschell, AIR (conference bio)
- Molly Stentz, WORT (conference bio)
- Eva Papp, Spinitron
More speakers will be announced in the coming days.
The conference’s intensives, three-hour focused add-ons to your conference experience, feature some of community and public media’s most influential thinkers and leaders. Some of the more exciting ones include:
- Jim Anderson of Goalbusters will take a deep dive into fundraising. Jim is known nationwide for his revenue work with everyone from rural community radio to public media heavy hitters. Some subjects you can expect Jim to examine: What are the challenges facing stations? What tactics can you use, regardless of size, to address those challenges? Creating community partnerships with local organizations (how to create the relationships and elevating your image). Creating underwriting relationships. The value of trades, and how to evaluate them. How to become more engaged and develop positive relationships to create financial support. How to hire the right people to generate revenue. The importance of locally produced programming, and how to maximize its impact. How to create engagement without major costs. Heady stuff, and well worth your time.
- So many stations are dealing with internal issues that cause organizations to falter or not meet their full potential. Tom Livingston of Livingston Associates leads the Raising a Community Station intensive. Tom is among the non-commercial media system’s most recognized strategists and teachers. Intensive attendees will get a questionnaire beforehand, so Tom makes sure this intensive is tailored to your needs and addresses the big cultural and governance questions you’re dealing with. Tom has had success as an executive coach, a talent scout and peacemaker in challenging organizational environments. This intensive is a must for those needing help with moving a station forward.
- Mike Henry (conference bio) is one of non-commercial music radio’s true legends, with skills in making major market stations as well as smaller stations click with audiences. He’s particularly skilled at helping you take a step back and think differently about your station, the music you air and the community you serve. Like Tom, Mike is aiming to tailor this session to your needs, and he’ll host a very interactive, conversational intensive that helps you take any station to another level as far as its message and relationship is concerned. This intensive is a must for stations looking to establish a music identity and those hoping for a reboot to foster fresh audiences.
- Community media newsgathering is a growing area of interest for stations, and the Solutions Journalism Network will lead an intensive on solutions journalism and how to implement it locally. This is more the necessary conversation about news vision: what your station does as far as news and how it does it. Frankly, it’s a discussion most stations don’t have until far later into the news lifecycle, and many leaders hoping to grow local news will see tremendous benefits from this intensive.
The conference schedule is here. Please register here to attend, and don’t forget to reserve your discounted hotel room today.
