Minutes of the Communication Committee
Ocean Avenue Campus, Room ArtsX 170 – December 4, 2007
Members Present: Tom Blair, Denise Dunne, Mamie How, Joe Jah, Martha Lucey, Andrea Niosi, Francine
Podenski
Members Absent: Atilla Gabor Donald Lind, Athena Steff, Beverlyn Jackson
Resource Persons Present: Beth Cataldo, Tom Hetherington
Resources Persons Absent: Bill Beaver
Guests: Maureen Barend, A. Smiley Curtis, Stephanie Rosenberg, Earthbound Media Group (EMG)
AGENDA
1.
2.
APPROVAL OF AGENDA
APPOVAL OF MINUTES
3.
OLD BUSINESS
A. EATV - CHANNEL 27 & 75 UPGRADE AND PROGRAMMING
Maureen Barend reported that EATV is on the air with the new system entirely. The transition to the new
digital system was a huge challenge and the staff worked extremely hard identifying and fixing all of the
glitches. Most of the bugs are worked out. Staff will continue to transfer the old media into digital format.
SCOLA has been added to channel 75 and airs on the weekend. SCOLA has a large community draw
because of its foreign language news programming. It might be in the college’s best interest to build a
new relationship with SCOLA by becoming an affiliate school. Currently City College receives SCOLA
through its relationship with San Francisco State University. If City College was an affiliate, all CCSF
instructors would gain access to SCOLA’s entire archive.
A question was asked about blackout times that sometimes occur on weekends on the eatv access
channels. Barend informed the committee that blackouts happen when the station is not staffed during
weekends and a glitch occurs in the automation system. A glitch can be caused a simple typo. During the
transition time when the station was switching to the new system, more glitches were occurring but now
that the station is completely switched over to the new digital server-based system, blackouts and glitches
in programming should be less frequent.
It was also suggested that an article be written for City Currents and an advertisement be placed in the
middle of the next time schedule promoting eatv and informing the community that City College of San
Francisco operates two educational access channels from the Broadcast Electronic Media Arts Department
Ocean Campus facility.
B. CITY CURRENTS EMAIL DISTRIBUTION
Martha Lucey commended Smiley Curtis on the fine job he and his staff are doing with City Currents. It
is an attractive newsletter and has wonderful photographs. The committee briefly revisited the discussion
on electronic distribution of City Currents. The option to receive City Currents in online format via a
weekly email with a link to the most recent edition was discussed. Alternatively, Mamie How suggested
that a link be placed on the CCSF homepage and bypassing the weekly email. , A link on the front page of
the new college website when the redesign project is completed would be a good idea. However, for the
time being, a weekly college-wide email will be sent out from the Marketing Office with a link to the
most recent issue. This process will begin in Spring 2008. It was also suggested that the Marketing Office
experiment reducing number of paper copies produced and distributed for a number of weeks, and see
whether it impacts the college.
4.
NEW BUSINESS
A. ELECTION OF COMMITTEE CHAIR
Martha Lucey nominated Francine Podenski as committee chair. Both Tom Blair and Joe Jah seconded
the motion. Podenski was unanimously elected chair of the committee.
B. WEB SITE FOCUS GROUP – EARTH BOUND MEDIA GROUP (EMG)
The committee participated in an hour-long focus group with EMG. Members where asked how they use
the website on a daily basis and how they access the pages they regularly use on the website.