If you are going away to a college like NEC this year, you are probably already excited about what your new life is going to be like, but also maybe a little bit nervous about navigating your way around college life. There are always lots of things you can get involved with on a college campus when you are not studying, and there will be lots of people to meet who you may find you have shared interests with, but finding out everything that is going on can be a bit bewildering at first.
If you want to help other people and get to know more and more of your fellow students once you have figured things out, a great way to do it can be by starting your own podcast about life at your chosen college. This can give other students a way to find out the latest news and upcoming things to do, but in such a way that they can listen to it while they are studying or walking around, rather than having to stop what they’re doing to read a blog or watch a video.
What Kind of Things Can You Include on Your Podcast?
Podcasts can be a great way to share all kinds of information, but you can also use them to do things like showcase music made by college bands, or interview people that other students will be interested in hearing about, such as college athletes. You can structure your podcast like a radio show with different segments that involve different topics or have different people talking, making it more interesting to listen to and allowing you to work together with other students to make it.
How Do You Make a Podcast?
You may find, depending on the facilities at your college, that there is a studio of some kind onsite that you can get permission to use to make your podcast. However, if that isn’t the case, or you prefer to make your show more independently without involving any college staff, then you can record a podcast in your room using basic audio editing software like Audacity and a reasonable microphone. The content is more important than the production quality, and plenty of people have managed to make engaging podcasts using equipment they already own. Try listening to other podcasts for inspiration!
Getting Listeners
There are lots of places you can publish your podcast, for example Soundcloud, but you will also want to make sure other people at your college know about it! Create social media accounts for your podcast show and be sure to use them to engage with other college focused accounts and Facebook pages, and if you can find anyone who is making other content related to your college, for example bloggers, then get in touch with them and ask them if they’ll do a post about you.
Creating a podcast can be fun and rewarding and help you make friends at college, and it can also give you some useful experience that may help you in your later career!