On The Job: Places You Might Accompany Your Broadcasting School Mentor

Remember field trips? For most of us, they meant getting out of class for a few hours and doing something presumably educational, like visiting a museum or seeing a play. Those field trips tended to become fewer and farther between by the time we all reached high school, but the fond memories remain - and in broadcasting school, you might relive them through class trips out of the radio station to work with your mentor in any of the multiple different locations broadcasters find themselves.

While many DJs spend their time at work manning the DJ booth, community events sometimes require DJ talent or welcome local radio stations to set up a booth. Since you might one day work one of these events, attending with your broadcasting school mentor and assisting in the running of the booth will be a valuable experience, giving you the training you'll need to have the experience to cover one of these events once you've found a position, whether at the radio station with your broadcasting school mentor or elsewhere.

When you think of radio station booths, what's the first thing that comes to mind? Most likely it's your local fair or music festival. Radio stations almost always have a booth there to publicize and promote and gain listeners. As a broadcasting school apprentice, you might visit a festival to help man the booth, an activity that can cover everything from taking over the microphone to talk to the crowd to passing out station swag to overseeing contests to win things like free radio station t-shirts. Since you're likely working with a station whose music you like pretty well, you'll probably be lucky enough to be near the festival venue where an artist your station plays is performing so you can listen to live music as you work. High school field trips were never quite like this!

Did you ever go the fair as a kid? Whether you attended a small local fair to ride the rides and check out the 4-H exhibits or trekked up to the big state fair to ride the (bigger) rides and eat as much cotton candy and fried food as possible, you probably recall seeing radio station booths there. Assisting your broadcasting school mentor at a fair involves much of the same activities as you would see at a festival, and the experience is just as valuable. If you live within driving distance of the state fairgrounds, you might even find yourself camped out at the state fair for your radio station once you've obtained a position there! Some fairs last up to two weeks or more, so you'll learn here that a future in radio definitely doesn't have to mean spending all your time sequestered in the DJ booth.

Not the outdoorsy type? Not to worry: as a DJ, you might also be sent to local clubs or malls for special promotions and events. Here's where events get really diverse, as you might find yourself assisting with DJing anything from a big contest to a local fashion show. When you're working an event at a mall or club, you have the responsibility to represent your station, the event, and even the community, so now's the time to impress! Since you'll probably be there mostly to help out your broadcasting school mentor and see how events like this work, this is a key time to do the best job you can to make sure the event runs smoothly.

These are only a few of the places broadcasting school might take you - by the time you graduate, you'll have a truly well-rounded look at what it's really like to work in radio. From the soundboard to the world outside, a career in broadcasting means so much more than simply sitting in an office all day. For more information on what broadcasting school can do for you, visit learn-by-doing.com.