Congratulations to the first graduates of the CUASS000099 Community Broadcasting Marketing Skill Set, the first course of its kind designed for community media managers, board, and committee members. 

Every week for 6 months, students from diverse media organisations across the country came together online to focus on topics including promotions, presentations, project management, fundraising, sponsorship, and leadership.

The course provides an opportunity to consolidate and develop on-the-job skills with assessment based on the planning and delivery of 2 major projects. 

For their final assessment, students presented a range of innovative fundraising projects relevant to their unique organisations.

Examples include a youth media alumni program, an ethnic community radio station small business sponsorship campaign, a content digitisation and online sales development project, a rural station OB van tour, and a small volunteer-run station on farming country partnering with a grain producers donation program for charities.

At the online graduation, students spoke about the importance of the relationships and networks they’d built through the course to understand how other stations operate, and share ideas, knowledge, experiences and achievements.

One station manager described the course as “a real eye opener” giving them the skills for streamlining ideas and detailed planning. Another felt that the project evaluation section was particularly valuable in a sector where we are usually rushing straight into the next thing.

“It gave me confidence to start my own projects and showed me the importance of realistic milestones” - THINK BIG Student

“The course was invaluable and highly recommended for any aspiring managers in community broadcasting or non-profits” – THINK BIG Student

Benefits that the stations themselves experienced included; team development, a successful regional outreach grant, and for one station, initiating a full strategic planning and governance review.

Community media organisations involved:

2MFM Sydney Muslim Radio; 2RPH Sydney; 2CCC Coast FM NSW Central Coast; 3SYN Media Melbourne; 3ZZZ Melbourne Ethnic Community Radio; 4RED 99.7 Bridge FM North Brisbane; 4MW Torres Strait; 4RFM Moranbah; 6ESP Hope FM Esperance; 6TCR 897fm Northern Perth; 7DBS Coast FM Northern Tasmania.