Volunteer-run broadcasters are a British tradition. The New York Times reports that among the hundreds of community radios in the UK, hospital radio stations are one of the less well-known: tiny operations, staffed by volunteers, that you would never know existed unless you’d been a patient here.

Despite the proliferation of technologies for listening to audio, hospital radio has ironically become more popular among patients, due to its unique position for personalization. Lisa Wells, a nurse treating Covid-19 patients at the Queen’s Medical Center in Nottingham, said in an email that she had been happy to collect requests because the radio was good for patients’ families as much as for the patients themselves. It gave people peace of mind “that somebody’s just gone that extra mile to personalize what is such a dreadful time,” she said.

Journalists, citizens, and politicians are calling for any future stimulus package for the Covid-19 crisis to include funding for local journalism. Advocates argue that communities across the U.S. are at risk of losing their source of news because of the pandemic. Commercial, public service and community broadcasters are essential sources of news and information for the communities they serve, offering a variety of viewpoints, and are often considered more trustworthy than social media.

Community radio WORT in Madison, Wi. offers a typical example. WORT local newscasts present alternative viewpoints – both in the sources it uses and the stories it covers. Newscasts include local and state news, weather, and regular features. It also aims to give underrepresented people a voice.

RadioExpert recognizes the tremendous value that local news provides to communities, and supports the inclusion of local media in future funding initiatives.

As the media landscape evolves and embraces digital convergence, so too have innovative student radios. These organizations are expanding their output to include text, images and video. Student Radio R in Brno, Czech Republic embodies this approach, and is continually evolving to meet the interests and media habits of the upcoming generation.

Another important element of assuring the future of student radio is to maintain adequate financial, political and social sustainability. At WSUM student radio at the University of Wisconsin, general manager David Black says the key is to focus on the mission statement; making sure everyone agrees and promotes it accordingly.

Whether through innovative programming, or focusing on sustainability, student radio in all it's forms must adapt and evolve to continue providing a real training ground for future professionals in media.

The Center for Media, Data and Society reports that the radio sector has been thriving in Africa in recent years, significantly diversifying in terms of ownership, content and access platforms. "Having a diverse radio framework helps deepen democracy" said Lumko Mtimde, former head of the Media Diversity and Development Agency (MDDA) in South Africa.

The largest radio conglomerate in the country, iHeartMedia, initiated a round of mass layoffs this week, cutting enough people that one former on-air host described Tuesday as “one of the worst days in on-air radio history.” The layoffs were concentrated in small and medium markets, where staffs had already been reduced, striking another major blow to local radio - according to an article in Rolling Stone magazine.

“We’ve gotten so far from local owners that radio is almost unrecognizable now,” said Karen Slade, vice president and general manager of the independently owned KJLH in Los Angeles, in a 2019 interview. “It’s dominated by massive corporate structures, and the communities that we need to service get lost in the shuffle between the giants.”

One former employee is quoted: “Any smaller to medium market in the country lost, in all likelihood, most, if not all, of their on-air staff. As far as the music stations go, there’s not a single local talent [left]."

iHeartMedia was able to wipe away much of its local presence thanks to a recent decision made by the Federal Communications Commission. In 2017, the FCC succeeded in getting rid of “the main studio rule,” meaning that stations were no longer required to maintain a studio or any staff near the location of their broadcast license.

RadioExpert, together with hosts Media Commun Occitanie and NGO's from around Europe, conducted a new project through the EU Erasmus+ Youth programme.

“REC Europe” seminar brought together social workers, trainers and activists to present their work and experiences within their communities and explored together the different forms, aspects and realities of new forms of art education.

This seminar combined theoretical and practical elements on sound for participation and social inclusion, attaching special value to group work. Theoretical inputs alternated with practical sessions in different areas of sound education, such as sound/music activities, connected with our different national uses of the methods.

The process created occasions for discussing the use of art as a methodology for participation and inclusion. Art education methods provide learning opportunities for personal and social competences, and are important tools for continued use in youth work.

You can listen to a podcast from the project here.

The Community Media Association of the United Kingdom is calling on its members, their friends and family, and the wider public to ask for more support and recognition for community radio from prospective MPs.

The announcement comes ahead of the deadline for all prospective candidates to submit their nomination for the upcoming General Election.

The CMA highlights three possible initiatives that will benefit current and aspiring community radio stations:

1. To call for a substantial increase in the Community Radio Fund to better meet the needs of current community radio stations and to support the new digital community radio stations to be licensed from next year.

2. To support a commitment from central and local Government to recognise that community radio is a low-cost and effective medium for reaching underserved communities and to direct a proportion of government advertising to community radio stations.

3. To commit to supporting a call to DCMS and Ofcom that community radio continues to be licensed on FM spectrum in parallel with the future rollout of licences on the new Small Scale DAB platform.

The appeal, published on Radio Today, notes that The Community Radio Fund, established by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and administered by Ofcom, has remained static at £400,000 for many years whilst the number of potential beneficiaries has grown significantly to nearly 300 stations.

Ofcom’s 2019 Communications Market Report shows that average income for community radio stations has fallen for another consecutive year to circa £49,000.

The CMA says Community Radio reaches underserved communities and should therefore be considered as a platform to carry local and national public service announcements.

The USA regulator FCC is one step closer to a rule change that threatens to de-fund community media and technology, by undermining a long-established principle that cable and internet companies owe rent to municipalities for use of the public right-of-way.

Sabrina Roach, board member of the Alliance for Community Media Foundation, joins the Radio Survivor podcast to discuss what’s at stake. The future of public access, educational and government TV channels and community media technology centers hangs in the balance.

The EU project "Europa On-Air" recently visited the Czech Republic for its 4th and final event - a weeklong series of cross-cultural experiences and broadcast journalism trainings for high school and university students; hosted by RadioExpert.

Participants from Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, and France produced interviews and reportage for programs on themes such as culture, technology, and gender.

The programs were then broadcast live via internet Radio R at Masaryk University in Brno, and via radio streams based in participants' home countries.

When Cyclone "Fani" recently devastated parts of Bangladesh, community radio was there to help. The community radios of Bangladesh stayed on the air during and after the storm, serving their communities with important news and information.

The community radio stations delivered critical information shared through radio broadcasting and mobile phones with the radio listeners club, who are representing their communities. They also broadcasted Public Service announcements and recorded interviews with local government representatives and disaster management committees.

For more info, contact Bazlur Rahman at Bangladesh Radio Network.

Dr. Nico Carpentier from the Media Studies Department at Charles University in Prague recently hosted a seminar on community media.

RadioExpert director Henry Loeser presented his exploration into the future of community broadcasting, and its potential for contributing to the future of local journalism.

Can community broadcasters effectively transisiton to online forms? And what are the keys for success and sustainability for community media in the digital age? You can see the answers to these and other questions in the full seminar video here.

The Native Public Media 2019 summit will be held on the homelands of the Gila River Indian Community at the Wild Horse Pass Hotel & Casino in Chandler, Arizona.

This year’s theme, Native Voices • Native Media • Native Truths, speaks to the critical role those broadcasters and media makers have in creating and sustaining a robust Native media ecosystem that connects Tribal nations and citizens.

The Association of Minnesota Public Educational Radio Stations (AMPERS) advises the state government on grants to the community radio stations that make up its membership. Of the 18 AMPERS stations in Minnesota, four are affiliated with Native American communities, six are licensed to colleges and all but one receives programming grants from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund.

Current reports that perhaps no station has done as much with the funding distributed through AMPERS as KFAI, one of four AMPERS members in the Twin Cities area. The scrappy FM outlet’s mission is serving “people ignored or misrepresented by mainstream media … while fostering the values of democracy and social justice.” Last year KFAI feature stories won a half-dozen awards from the Minnesota Society of Professional Journalists. “For a tiny community radio station competing against Minnesota Public Radio and other folks, we felt really good about winning six times,” said Todd Melby, managing editor.

Radio WTIP in the resort town of Grand Marais serves Cook County, the largest county in Minnesota with the smallest population. The AMPERS member station sits on the northern shore of Lake Superior, about 40 miles southwest of the Canadian border. In recent years it has become the primary media outlet for what is known as the Arrowhead Region of Minnesota, according to Matthew Brown, station manager. This has meant covering the county commission, the city council and local township boards as well as reporting on local weather in great detail, power outages and road closings.

“We really try to be as local as we can be,” said Brown.

President Donald Trump’s proposed budget for 2020 aims to cut all funding for the TV Public Broadcasting Service and the National Public Radio network, along with the National Endowment for the Arts. The budget would also eiminate any federal funding to local community radios across the USA.

Patricia Harrison, President of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which disperses the federal funds to hundredes of TV and radio stations, stated: "The elimination of federal funding to CPB would initially devastate and ultimately destroy public media's role in early childhood education, public safety, connecting citizens to our history, and promoting civil discussions - all for Americans in both rural and urban communities,"

The money is distributed through grants and every organization from the smallest, rural public radio station to the largest public television station can apply for grants to the CPB. According to the CPB, by law, 95% of the federal appropriation of the CPB is provided as grants to local television and radio stations.