Radio Broadcast (May-Oct 1925)

The Revolution in the Art of Teaching The Long Arm of Radio Is Bringing the Best from the College to the Remotest Districts— What the Public Wants and How Their Wants Are Being Met By FREDERICK P. MAYER THE long trips on cold trains in winter, the meals in poor restaurants, the leaving of work and papers to do what seemed of doubtful permanency are things that only the professor who used to give lectures to small groups in various communities can understand. The university extension course was given in the high school auditorium of some small town where there were enough high, school' and grade school teachers and enough interested club women to make an audience of perhaps a hundred. To this small group, the university sent out, at a heavy financial outlay, a part-time "extra-mural" teacher who traveled to the small town from his school, delivered his lecture to the one hundred teachers, and went home again — with little done for the outer world of popular education and little done for himself and his school. But radio is changing all this. The professor of to-day prepares his lecture for his radio class with greater care than he gives to the class lecture on the campus. His audience may include professors in his own field who are eager to check the work his school is doing; he knows that business men and high school boys, men in barber shops and clubs are his class. Giving the Teacher the Air TS ANOTHER experiment with the possi*■ bilities of radio. Mr. Mayer does not attempt to tell what every university and college in the country has tried to do with broadcasting, but he does tell what has been in progress at Pittsburgh. Columbia, Rennselear Polytechnic, New York University, Kansas State Agricultural College, and many others for some time have been broadcasting subjects gathered from their class rooms. And many broadcasters have presented talks given by members of various college faculties. There are many who feel that radio can never lend the personal contact that the University has always felt to be a necessity for instruction. But there are others who are quite willing to let radio do what it can to broaden the scope of higher education, and some of the experiments seem to prove that radio has indeed a field here. It is maintained by some that broadcasting is more a medium for entertainment than instruction, but those who are in charge of the various "air courses'' undoubtedly have something to say about that. In an early number, Radio Broadcast will publish an article by Major J. Andrew White, the famous descriptive broadcaster, which humorously shows that radio education is — well, not as effective as it might be. — The Editor Having prepared his lecture, he goes to the broadcasting studio, that curious muffled room where his voice frightens him by meeting him as he walks in. The room is draped with gray cloth, and there are wicker chairs, a desk, and floor lamps. And reasonably inconspicuous, are the ever-faithful microphones, from which you hear the lecture on "Why Read Fiction?" or "Political Parties from Washington to Jackson," listeners-in from Florida to Washington, and throughout Canada eagerly tune-in. The light flashes; the man at the announcer's desk calls "all right" to his friends at the broadcasting station; they return the signal; he flashes the "Silence" sign at the desk, and opens the line. The air is ready. The instructor begins after the University announcer says, "Good evening! This is the University of Pittsburgh studio of station kdka, East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This evening, Professor Smith, of the English Department is going to talk to you about 'The Contemporary Novel.'" Then a slight pause, and the Professor begins his talk. This is what has been occurring regularly at kdka in cooperation with the University of Pittsburgh, and is true of other broadcasting stations in many parts