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By Elizabeth Kemmerer
The nation elected its first African American president on Nov. 4, and the historic event was covered on campus through the work of hundreds of students, faculty, and staff during the College’s second student-run, live election-night television broadcast.
From a studio in Farinon College Center, Lafayette’s Electoral College provided analysis of political trends, up-to-the-minute results, and panel discussions on races for the White House, Senate, and House of Representatives.
The event, which was sponsored by the Policy Studies program and guided by consultants from New Century Productions, was Lafayette’s second broadcast. The first was held during the congressional election of 2006, but this was the College’s first presidential election broadcast.
According to organizer Mark Crain, William E. Simon Professor of Political Economy and chair of Policy Studies, nearly 300 students contributed their time and diverse talents to the production.
“The production went off like clockwork,” he says. “It was well-coordinated, the students truly stepped up and took ownership of it, and they worked well together as a team. It was so well done.”
President Daniel Weiss kicked-off the broadcast, and anchors Jeff Katz ’10, Stephanie Kramer ’09, and Jayne Miller ’10 supplied updated returns, interviews, analyses, and commentaries. Other students were members of discussion bullpens, tracked political blogs, put together pre-recorded topical video segments, or took part in the production end of the broadcast.
Even though the broadcast was full of excitement, it was largely meant as an educational experience for the students. A fact that was not lost on Katz, who believes this experience will have a large impact on his career.
“Before this, I wanted mainly to get into finance after college,” says Katz, a double major in policy studies and economics & business and a defensive lineman on the football team. “Now, I’m also really interested in the political process, so I’m thinking about the field of political economy. Being a part of this broadcast has helped to broaden my horizons. Now I see what other options might be open to me in the future.”
The job of making sure all the various aspects of the broadcast come together fell largely on the shoulders of stage manager Jeff Cumming ’10, who is more than satisfied with how the production worked out and all that he has learned.
“Everything went so smoothly,” says Cumming, a double major in policy studies and economics & business and a fullback on the football team. “A lot of people put a lot of work into making this happen. It’s so great to see it all come together so well. I learned quite a bit about what it takes to see something like this through from the drawing board to reality, as well as the political process. I think those are skills I’ll find useful no matter what field I end up in.”
Nicole Crain, visiting professor of economics and business, commented on the level of depth and quality added to this year’s broadcast due to the vast and diverse group of students who took ownership of the production.
“This was a truly remarkable production for such a small school and it’s because of the caliber of our students, faculty, and staff,” Crain says. “Many more classes and student organizations contributed this year. One of our journalism classes was in charge of the blog watching; a GIS class was creating all of the maps for the political analysts; statistics classes and art classes contributed significantly. If even one of those components was missing, the broadcast wouldn’t have been what it was. This was truly an all-encompassing production for our campus.”
Amanda Pisetzner ’09, a government and law major who led one of the bullpen discussions, also commented on Lafayette’s close student-faculty interaction and vast resources that help to pull off a production such as this.
“Not only does Lafayette have the financial resources to do something like this, despite being such a small school, but we have the intellectual resources as well,” she says. “Our professors are real adventurers. They want us as students to have experiences like this and will often do whatever it takes to make that happen.”