This summer, I interned in the public relations department at WHDH-7 News in Boston, Massachusetts. The experiences I’ve encountered were unforgettable.

Every day, I would check the voicemails and e-mails because there is always a message, typically about how someone is upset about something. Sometimes, the voicemails were funny and interesting to listen to. Other times, it was scary. I’ve had voicemails that congratulated the station and voicemails that trashed the station. I’ve, at one point, received a threatening voicemail that actually scared me.

But whether it was a bad or good voicemail or e-mail, this was the experience I wanted to get. I wanted to connect with the station’s viewers and that’s how they voice their opinions.

Photo contributed by Justin Mahan

A majority of my work was researching events in and around the Boston area to put on our website’s community calendar. I looked at school districts, city hall events, museums and more.

One of the more interesting aspects of my internship was that I was able to go to a station-sponsored event and walk around with one of the anchors. This was an amazing experience because in the community relations department, one of our jobs is to represent the station at these events. I had become the face of the station to the community and it made me feel like I was actually trusted in the department.

Another job I did while at the station was watching Public Service Announcements (PSA). My task was to watch and critique the PSAs and decide whether or not it would make it on air. That was another point that I felt that I had responsibility, because I was deciding if people watching our channel would be seeing the PSA that I had critiqued.

The last major thing that I did at the station was conduct station tours. I assisted my supervisor with the tour and helped lead the group through the studio. My work with KSC-TV definitely helped with this because I was able to answer a lot of questions that I otherwise wouldn’t have known.

Overall, I was overcome with excitement at the opportunity to take on this internship. It was surreal seeing the station in-person and even seeing some of the anchors and reporters that I grew up watching. I was able to go down to the anchor desk, walk around the entire building freely and talk with some of the staff about what I should be doing to get into that field.

On campus, I’ve done almost everything in the television studio. I’ve been on camera, a reporter, a producer, a director and helped the intro courses learn the ways of the studio. But, I never got a behind the scenes look at television. I didn’t get to experience, on campus, what it’s like to receive the public’s opinions and suggestions and really understand what the viewer wants to see. With this internship, I got that experience. And I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

Justin Mahan can be contacted at jmahan@kscequinox.com

Lions and tigers and, leopards? Oh my.

A group of ten Keene State College students left New Hampshire for Spring Break on March 11 but weren’t headed for the beach. They were headed for Pittsboro, North Carolina to spend their spring break volunteering.

Photo Contributed by Justin Mahan

The group is part of the Alternative Break Program through the Community Service Office and spent the week volunteering at Carolina Tiger Rescue, helping do the maintenance work for the facility so the staff could focus their attention on the animals in need.

Carolina Tiger Rescue gets their animals from all over the country from situations like abuse through entertainment, abandonment and even neglect. When the facility receives these animals, they give them a happy permanent home for the rest of their lives.

The contingent from Keene worked alongside members from the University of Vermont to do things such as trail maintenance, cleaned out empty enclosures for the arrival of a new animal, and sorted fence pieces for either reuse or recycle.

The trail work allowed for the staff to safely inspect surrounding enclosures quickly in the event of an emergency to ensure that the animals were where they were supposed to be.

The enclosure cleansing was conducted in order for a new animal to be introduced to the enclosure. The participants clipped the vines that were growing on the enclosure fencing, as well as pick up cut logs that the staff had cut prior to the groups arrival.

Photo Contributed by Justin Mahan

The group also helped with the recycling of fence pieces. They sorted through the scrap pile of fencing and threw away any bent, rusted or broken pieces and moved those salvageable to a new pile for the staff to use at a later date.

While the students were doing hard work throughout the week, they were surrounded by the animals and learning about their stories and about the issues that animals face while living in the United States.

Carolina Tiger Rescue operates to raise awareness of the abuse and conditions these animals are living in and hope for the day that these animals will only be found in their natural habitats and not in the backyards of the United States.

The group spent their off days recovering from the work day and exploring the small town feel of Pittsboro, shopping downtown and getting to know some of the locals, all while spreading awareness of animal rights.

The Keene State community looks to rally together in unity after controversial symbols were burned and posters were found on campus. On Nov. 21, a swastika symbol was burned onto the ceiling in a Carle Hall bathroom and white supremacy posters were found around campus and in the Keene Community.

“It’s disappointing to see that someone chose to deface Keene State property in such a way,” said KSC Student Body President Laura Graham. “but I am hopeful that we as students can come together and support one another if someone feels scared.”

Keene State psychology professor Lawrence Welkowitz observed the damage to the bathroom, and said in times like these, especially “in the wake of months of hateful rhetoric,” it’s not surprising if some don’t feel safe on campus.

Among the many concerned parties on campus is Chief Officer for Diversity and Multiculturalism Dottie Morris, who described her concerns about the students’ well being. “I was concerned about how students would react,” said Morris. “I was really concerned about students and any kind of concern they have relating to the symbols that they were exposed to.”

Photo contributed anonymously

According to Keene State Director of Strategic Communications and Community Relations Kelly Ricaurte, Campus Safety is investigating the issue. KPD was reached for a comment and they said the Officer Matthew Bomberg is working the KSC Campus Safety to resolve the issue.

“The college is conducting a thorough investigation into the incident in Carle Hall,” said Ricaurte, “and will continue to do so until all avenues have been exhausted. The college will hold the responsible person accountable within the guidelines of the college’s Code of Conduct.”

Carle Hall Residence Director Megan Barbato has not replied to a request for comment.

KSC President Anne Huot sent a message to the campus community four days after the incident regarding the steps being taken to address the issue and move forward as a community. She stated, “As we go forward in these turbulent and challenging times, we must seek common ground and protect our core values of civility, inclusiveness and respect,” stated President Huot. “There is no place on our campus for acts of aggression, violence and intolerance. Importantly, the placement of that swastika was jarring and interfered with students’ ability to learn and live in a respectful space and it has absolutely no place at Keene State College.”

Another finding

The Swastika was not the only concerning image found on campus Tuesday.

KSC senior Kennedy Redden shared his encounter of finding white supremacy posters at the Joyce Athletic Fields.

“There was a little shed at the athletic field,” said Redden, “and I saw the poster hanging on there and it said, ‘Are you sick of the anti-white propaganda that’s in the college?’” Redden mentioned that at first, he wasn’t aware if he should report it to campus safety or not, so he took an image and sent it to some friends who redirected it to the Office of Diversity and Multiculturalism, where it was then reported to Campus Safety.

Ricaurte mentioned that an ongoing investigation of this matter is being conducted as well.

On top of the poster being sighted on campus, another was found at the Keene Public Library.

“It shows the complexity of what we’re dealing with,” said Morris, “and what we have dealt with on campus. We have to make everything a teachable moment. Discussing what does that type of symbol mean and what it might evoke to certain people is important and why so many people are talking about it.”

Where to report incidents

Morris said part of this education process is for students to know where to go if this incident arises again. Morris mentioned that the best thing to do is to take a picture and report it.

An individual can do so by contacting Campus Safety or by filling out a silent witness form, making the claim anonymous.

After receiving the claim, Campus Safety will respond immediately and conduct an investigation.

“College campuses are sacred places where we can work on understanding and solving human problems,” said Welkowitz. “I never take it for granted how lucky I am to be here.”

“We, as a community, need to come together and really support one another,” said Morris, “and figure out ways that we can engage with each other that provides an opportunity for growth.”

“I think that it is important that students feel comfortable in their living and learning space,” said Graham, “and know if they don’t, there are people all around campus they can lean on.”

Justin Mahan can be contacted at jmahan@kscequinox.com 

A popular food item for students in Keene State College’s Night Owl Café have ‘sizzled’ away on Fridays. Sizzlers, which are fried sandwiches with an array of fillings to choose from, are now no longer being offered to students on Fridays because of campus-wide budget cuts.

Keene State is looking far and wide for different ways to consolidate the budget within student services. With that comes a few changes for Keene State Dining Services.

“This was an area where we were asked to look at the services we provide and [figure out] which services didn’t seem to be providing as much service as the other services we’re providing,” said Keene State Dining Services General Manager Josef Quirinale.

The option to remove sizzlers from the Friday menu was one of the few things that were given as an option to curtail as an effect of the budget cuts.

“We carefully looked at all areas and on Friday’s, the sizzler isn’t as popular as it is Monday through Thursday,” said Quirinale. “The decision was made and it wasn’t made by us quite honestly. It was a campus decision, and certain items were chosen from the list that we provided as services to be curtailed.”

While most of the items on the list pertain to internal operations, a few involve the students. Some of those include slight menu changes, as well as a cease to the popular Wednesday Night Cobbler dessert line.

“We ended up having to provide the cobbler line less often because there is a labor issue associated with that,” said Quirinale. “Dessert is dessert. We make dessert, but there’s an attendant that has to set up for that event and serve it, and that is labor intensive.”

KSC junior Hannah Rettig mentioned that there are a few options that she can think of as alternatives to suspending the Friday operation of sizzlers. “It’s like four hours that you’re paying people to stand there,” said Rettig. “I feel like maybe even closing Hoot [‘n’ Scoot] instead, depending on how busy it is, might be better.”

Rettig is one of many students that have high praise for sizzlers, including telling the beauty of them to prospective students. “I know when I give tours I tell all the tours that sizzlers are awesome and they’re very unique to Keene and Keene State,” said Rettig.

Even with the high praise for sizzlers, some students say that the change hasn’t really affected them. “I don’t get sizzlers very often,” said KSC junior Courtney Dillon. “I don’t take advantage of that [sizzlers] enough. I’ve probably only had two sizzlers this year. For me, I didn’t even know it had happened.”

“I definitely think sizzlers are awesome,” said Rettig, “and they’re [Sodexo] only paying two people to stand there and make sizzlers.” She continued, “I think a lot of students take advantage of sizzlers because they’re good.”

While the decision seemed to be an easy one for the campus, Quirinale said that it wasn’t an easy choice to decide what to cut costs from.

“Our job is really to provide as much variety and as much satisfaction for the students as we possibly can,” said Quirinale. “We do that so when it comes time for us to be told we need to trim your operation a little bit [and] where can you trim it, it’s difficult for us to choose, but we have to choose what we feel will create a lesser of an effect.”

While the cobbler line will return for Thanksgiving dinner in the  Zorn Dining Commons, most services will not return unless an increase in budget occurs.

“When we curtail something, we really look at the entire picture of what we’re doing,” said Quirinale, “and we find what will have the least impact on the students and those are the things we trim a little bit of.”

“It’s never an easy decision,” said Quirinale. “It really isn’t.”

Justin Mahan can be contacted at jmahan@kscequinox.com