Expansion of WVFI was the right choice
Editorial
The move of WVFI from limited campus Internet broadcast to unlimited global Internet broadcast will give Notre Dame students a chance to demonstrate their professionalism and improve their skills. Nothing prepares students better for careers in broadcast after college than the real world experience they can gain at a student radio station. WVFI's global broadcasts will give students this opportunity.
The question arises, therefore: why weren't students always given this opportunity? When the Notre Dame administration learned that WVFI was able to broadcast globally on the Internet in the Fall of 1999, it quickly cut off the station's access. Rather than giving the students the chance to prove themselves as professionals, the administration silenced the Voice of the Fighting Irish to the world.
Finally, one year later, the administration has relented and pulled the gag from WVFI. Station manager Adam Frick and his staff said that morale suffered at the station during the year of campus-only broadcasts. The global gag placed over WVFI sent a clear message to the students who spend so much time and energy trying to make the station better: you aren't very good and we don't trust you.
Now that the gag has been lifted, Frick said the station is "light years ahead of where we were last year" at a press conference Wednesday. Notre Dame students are bright and intelligent people who rise to the challenges that face them. When high standards are expected, Notre Dame students will achieve these high standards.
The Notre Dame administration was right to lift the global broadcast ban that it had placed on WVFI. Now Frick and his staff finally have the chance to show how good they can be.
All Viewpoint Stories for Friday, November 3, 2000
