For a number of years, ORCTV has given Old Rochester Regional High School $74,000 each year to fund a teaching position for TV and video journalism production courses at ORR. That funding will stop for this fiscal year, and ORCTV Executive Director Robert Chiarito says ORCTV, which relocated back to ORR last year, will resume the student programming from a more in-house method.
Some ORR School Committee members seemed shocked by the decision, and some members as well as students worried the quality technology programming that ORCTV had funded up until now would end with it.
School Superintendent Doug White said ORCTV informed the district last year that the funding would cease, but the district had already budgeted for it and included the courses in the program of studies. ORCTV subsequently provided $54,000 last year as a last-time grant payment.
Now White says that he would like to see the district come up with the funding on its own to keep the same TV production and video journalism courses and a school staff member to teach them.
“We would like to see and have the opportunity to continue those opportunities in our schools and within our budget,” said White. “They (ORCTV) no longer would like to offer those dollars to us and look to provide educational television through a different means.”
White said all he could do was talk to Tri-Town selectmen about how the school could fund the position and keep the courses. The hope, he said, is to see the same amount in ORCTV funds go back into the school budget.
“I guess I’m perplexed because of how successful those classes have been with some of our students in the past,” said school committee member Carey Humphrey. “My daughter was a product of that class, and I know what it instills in those students and it’s very, very important … because of what it does to prepare them for the future.”
And if it is the boards of selectmen that provide the funding to ORCTV, said Humphrey, “It sounds like there’s some politics involved.” He added, “It just smells very political to me and it smells like … [someone is] doing this out of spite…”
Fifty-one students signed a petition in support of continuing the TV production and VJ courses, and student Ethan Mort said, “I definitely think a lot of students were inspired by the [program]. I think it would be a huge shame and a huge loss if we were to lose it right now.”
ORR District Video Coordinator Deb Stinson said, as educators, “We’re the ones who should be managing the educational channel.”
For White, it is “the impact of what it’s done for the students of Tri-Town, and what could be lost as a result of that funding mechanism being taken away.”
Chiarito, however, says that students are not losing any of the educational opportunities it once provided; instead, ORCTV is stepping up to offer the programming itself while taking a leadership role in its execution.
Chiarito explained during a phone interview that the funding was never meant to be a permanent source of funding for ORR, and the Old Rochester Regional school district was aware of this.
One of the founding members of ORCTV, Ken Souza, said in a letter addressed to ORCTV Board of Directors President Jay Pateakos that when ORCTV initially moved out from the ORR campus years ago, board member Reg Foster recommended a one-time grant as part of the original contract with the tri-towns to fund a teaching position at the high school as a “good-faith gesture,” wrote Souza.
“This was never intended to be an ongoing or recurrent budget item,” continued Souza.
Somewhere along the line, he said, subsequent ORCTV boards and the high school took that line item for granted, although that was never the intent.
Earlier this school year, ORCTV joined the school’s School to Career Path Program, allowing students the opportunity to come to the ORCTV studio for real-life hands-on learning, work-study, apprenticeships, and career experience.
Half a dozen students right away signed up, according to Chiarito, and by next week they’ll have produced their first weekly program. “And this is something we’re going to expand upon next year.”
“We wanted to reach the kids who are the most interested, who really wanted to further their education and careers and maybe use this stuff in college,” said Chiarito, who feels this type of instruction better prepares students who want to pursue TV careers in college than the ORCTV-funded school courses did.
With students recording school sports games, studio experience behind the camera, as well as graphics, directing, sound, and writing scripts – and whatever the student is interested in, “The level of stuff that they’re getting here is more like a college course,” said Chiarito. “And they’ve really taken to it.”
Next year, ORCTV wants to expand all that to more kids, and ORCTV also has been doing an afterschool club that started around the same time.
“There’s really nothing political about this at all,” said Pateakos in an email. “The grant that ORR had been receiving was never meant to be a permanent thing…. Our Board has decided to move more in-house with educational programming.”
Says Chiarito, “We’re not taking anything away from anybody. We’re just doing it in a different manner.”
“We have a limited budget and [the school district] has one, and we just couldn’t afford it anymore,” said Chiarito.
Most other community TV stations do not offer grants to district schools, according to Chiarito.
“We’re not taking anything away from the kids…. We are offering things to the students and we are hoping that it will be throughout the [entire tri-town] school district…. We really want to make sure that were reaching out to everybody.”
“It’s not a political move whatsoever,” Chiarito continued. “It’s just us trying to get a hold of our budget because we are a small station running five channels and most other stations … they’ve all got four, five or more employees and we’ve been doing this the entire time with two people.”
Students of the newer programming, Chiarito said, are providing him with “extremely positive feedback.”
“The kids love it,” he said. “So far I’m really, really pleased by what I’ve seen. It’s gone beyond my wildest imagination.”
The mainly student-driven program, says Chiarito, is “a really solid program that the school can be proud.”
By Jean Perry