Last week, Upstart radio finally came together. On Tuesday, we chose our final six children to make up the production team. All in all, I’m very happy with our selection. We have an even mix of three boys and three girls, namely Nkubecko, Reggie, Xabiso, Aphiwe, Aphiwe and Aviwe. From what I have seen of them so far, they are enthusiastic, talkative, keen to learn and excited to be part of the team.
On Saturday, Refilwe and I hosted our first workshop with the radio team. It was mainly centred on orientating the young Upstarters, making sure that they had a solid understanding of what they will be doing over the next few months. As part of this, we wanted to start the process of getting to know each other. We wanted, above all, to encourage the team to talk about what is important in their lives and what they expect of the show. We did this by asking each other harmless, fun questions - such as what our favourite music is. Then we each drew a ‘body map’, which explained personal issues such as what we think is important in our lives, what we want to see in the show, what we think of our friends and families etc. This was an interactive exercise that got each upstarter thinking deeply and creatively.
After having hosted the workshop, I now have a much clearer view of certain little potential problems that we might face. Cliques are already starting to form, especially between two of the boys, leaving the other one out. For instance when we asked them to get into pairs the two boys paired themselves together immediately. It is still early days though, with plenty of time for us to to get to know one another.’
Another problem is clearly going to be that of working within the constraints of time. An hour and a half every Friday seems to be the only time that the Upstarters are available to work with us in the context of a workshop. However, we will be settng them homework assignments after every workshop so that they have time to go home and reflect on and work on the principles that they were taught. We hope as they want to be part of the team, they will be happy to do this, and willing to engage with the concepts as much as time will allow them.
The workshop that we ran on Saturday was actually supposed to take place on Friday, but only two of the Upstarters pitched up, forcing us to reschedule. I find this a real worry. Will this happen again? Will some be missing when we need them the most?
Another potential problem relates to the team’s capacity to retain information. Throughout the week, the children have school every day, and when they get back home they have homework and possibly numerous house chores. With all of this going on, do they have a chance to spend a lot of time thinking about Upstart Radio? Will they forget everything by the time it is the next workshop? Again, I am hoping that the assignments we set will allow them to stay familiar with Upstart throughout the week, and I’m also hoping that they enjoy it enough not to forget!
Lastly, a final challenge might be that we have a group that are full of personality, lively and talkative. There is no doubt that most of them will be interested in taking the role of anchor. So how do we work around that? Do they take turns, or do we encourage some to specialise in other roles such as a technician, and will we be able to encourage them to do so?
These are, of course, all issues that can be ironed out as we go along, and we might not need even to worry about them at all. I told the Upstart Radio team what I think the show should be about - that is, that it should to be fun and light hearted, with jokes, music, competitions and shout outs, but also importantly, that it should explore issues such as substance abuse, gender roles, sex etc. I was pleased to see that they all nodded their heads in agreement and excitement, After they expressed themselves in the body maps in terms of the issues they hope to address it is clear that we all have similar aspirations. So I am now much more assured and very much looking forward to taking the show in this direction.
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