Support the WBAA Arts and Culture Reporter Project

WBAA Arts And Culture Reporter Project: Case for Support.

The mission of the WBAA Arts and Culture Reporter Project is to enhance the prominence of arts and culture in the community to benefit the overall livability and economic vitality of the community in which WBAA operates.

Our goal is to:
1. Improve the community’s awareness of the diverse and abundant cultural events taking place within the Greater Lafayette and surrounding communities.
2. Inspire citizens to engage in the arts, which expose and demand critical thinking about issues of global social significance.
3. Explore ways to create a broader and deeper audience for a variety of art and cultural affairs.
4. Broaden WBAA’s listenership and financial support through enhanced programming and services made possible by a dedicated arts and culture reporter.

Our objective is to hire a dedicated, full-time arts and culture reporter by the fall of 2015 who would be responsible for at least:
• Researching, producing, writing, editing and recording short and long form sound-rich features on arts and culture in the Greater Lafayette and surrounding areas in WBAA’s broadcast range. Works would include profiles on individuals, groups, events, exhibits and more;
• Creating arts related news stories for WBAA newscasts as well as contributing stories when possible for state and national networks, including NPR;
• Maintaining a WBAA and/or community-wide art and cultural events calendar, including sending direct e-mails to interested listeners with select events and updates made to the calendar;
• Maintaining an active blog and/or social media feed with informal elaborations on more formal stories as well as stories of general interest significance.

Measuring Success: The long-term impact of this project will be measured by increased attendance at events in Greater Lafayette and the surrounding communities. More immediately, WBAA will be able to measure success through the number of stories broadcast on AM 920 and 101.3 FM as well as downloaded from WBAA.org.

Financing: The total annual cost to WBAA for hiring a full-time arts and culture reporter would be approximately $50,000, which includes $45-47,000 in salary and benefits as well as an additional $3-5,000 for travel and other expenses. This project is 100% dependent upon community support for the first two years, with the goal of this position becoming self-sustaining in the years to follow through increased corporate and individual support made possible through enhanced programming and services. WBAA will be exploring federal and state grants, private foundation support as well as other strategic partnerships with local organizations to raise the initial $100,000. Over $7,000 in initial support has already been pledged by individuals in the community.

History: This project is a direct response to the requests of listeners for enhanced services in the arts as well as a natural strategic alignment that the station saw in the Cultural Plan for Lafayette and West Lafayette created in 2009. The project has received endorsements from the Mayors of Lafayette and West Lafayette as well as the Chair of the Quality of Life Council for the Greater Lafayette Commerce. Letters of their support are available upon request.

If you are interested in supporting this position or in learning more, please contact WBAA’s Development Director, Chrissie Ankerberg, at (765) 496-7794 or by email at ceankerberg@prf.org.