Education by Radio (1937)

VOL. 7 AUGUST 1937 No 8 EDUCATION BY RADIO is published monthly by THE NATIONAL COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION BY RADIO S. Howard Evans, secretary One Madison Avenue, New York, N. Y. Committee Members and Organizations They Represent Arthur G. Crane, chairman, president. University of Wyoming, Laramie, Wyoming, National Association of State Universities. James E. Cummings, department of education. Na¬ tional Catholic Welfare Conference, 1312 Massa¬ chusetts Avenue, Washington, D. C., National Catholic Educational Association. J. 0. Keller, assistant to the president, in charge of extension, Pennsylvania State College, State College, Pennsylvania, National University Extension Asso¬ ciation. Harold B. McCarty, program director, state broad¬ casting station WHA, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, National Association of Edu¬ cational Broadcasters. Charles A. Robinson, S. J., St. Louis University, St. Louis, Missouri, The Jesuit Educational Asso¬ ciation. Agnes Samuelson, state superintendent of public in¬ struction, Des Moines, Iowa, National Council of State Superintendents. Willis A. Sutton, superintendent of schoob, Atlanta, Georgia, National Education Association. H. J. Umberger, vicechairman, Kansas State College of Agriculture and Applied Science, Manhattan, Kansas, Association of Land-Grant Colleges and U niversities. George F. Zook, president, American Council on Edu¬ cation, 744 Jackson Place, Washington, D. C., American Council on Education. MEMBER EDUCATIONAL PRESS ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA KOAC, the state-owned station at Corvallis, Oregon, reports that radio playvvriting is now a statewide activity among the 40,000 4-H Club members. Starting in 1935, when a few plays were written for presentation by county groups over KOAC, the practise has now devel¬ oped into a statewide contest with summer school scholarships and cash prizes offered annually as awards for the most outstanding scripts. This year eight plays were chosen from the large num¬ ber submitted. KOAC arranged with 4-H officials for daily rehearsal periods for the students participating in the nightly county broadcasts. To meet the growing interest in radio playwriting three elective classes were provided the students. Girl authors had previously predominated in the classes until two play demonstrations were of¬ fered before the assembled 1700 club members. Boy clubbers then became interested to the e.xtent that they now outnumber the girls in the special course. Lincoln W. Miller of the KOAC staff is in charge of the annual 4-H Club contest. He has offered to provide interested persons with copies of the plan for organizing statewide 4-H play writing contests. The radio institute held in Dallas. Texas. July 7 was attended by approximately 150 persons from all parts of the state. This meeting, the first of its kind in the southwest, marked the beginning of plans for a statewide program of radio education in Texas. Dr. L. B. Cooper, director of research for the Texas State Teachers .Association, is now perfecting the plans. drama on the variety program, “March of Youth,” which is presented weekly by a local station with the cooperation of the Detroit public schools. A member of the Advisory Committee guides the municipal uni¬ versity’s radio programs. This year the “Wayne University School of the Air” featured reviews of books high in current interest. These reviews, written by members of the faculty or English teachers in the high schools, were read bv “Wayne University’s Voice of the Air.” The second program, “Wayne University Students,” a variety pro¬ gram, provided Wayne students an opportunity to appear “on the air.” The first draft of each script in the “Our World Today,” “Public School Talent,” and “Occupations on Parade” series is sent to mem¬ bers of the Advisory Committee for evaluation. The regular broad¬ cast is also evaluated by this Committee. Some of the new experiments inaugurated and carried out this year by the Committee were as follows: “Occupations on Parade,” a program offering vocational informa¬ tion, was broadcast into the intermediate and high schools. Lead'ers in various professional and industrial fields in Detroit gave inter¬ views, talks, or helped in dramatic episodes to make more clear the needs and conditions of the occupational fields they represented. “Our World Today,” a weekly program designed to supplement and integrate the work of social science, general science, and litera¬ ture in the schools, was continued from last year and broadcast into the elementary schools. To make this program more effective, the first draft of each script was submitted for evaluation to [1] a mem¬ ber of the Advisory Committee, [2] a member of the script writing department of the commercial station broadcasting the program, [3 I a school principal, and [4] a specialist in the field featured. In addition, the first draft was read to a group of students and reactions to vocabulary, content, and interest noted. The second draft incor¬ porated as many of the valuable suggestions received as possible. Each week a different school was visited during the actual broadcast and reactions noted. One broadcast in a school was observed by four members of the Advisory Committee. Students, teachers, and prin¬ cipals were encouraged to write in their criticisms of script and production and suggestions for future broadcasts. In every case the district visited personally displayed greater interest or greater energy in writing to tell of the effects of the programs. Astronomy clubs, signal apparatus built by a father and son after a broadcast on “Smoke Puffs to Dots and Dashes,” auditorium plays inspired by a program on Handel, requests to use radio programs as part of school pageants for the younger children, and skits prepared “on the spot” were some of the results noted by teachers. Our “Public School Talent” program, alternating music and drama, altho addressed to adults, has slowly worked its way into the schools, and the request has been made that this program be broadcast directly into the classrooms. This program also serves to interpret the schools to the community because the music is a direct outgrowth of classroom work and the drama programs are selected by the students from classics studied in the English classes. The five regular weekly programs, reduced by the Advisory Com¬ mittee from the ’ten of last year, have each been given careful attention. Whether these shall be continued or new programs pre¬ sented is only one of the problems in educational broadcasting being considered at this time by the Advisory Committee on Visual and Radio Education in Detroit. — Kathleen X. Lardie. [36]