The play-by-play of a broadcasting adventure
Who says adults have to work boring desk jobs? Joel Hoover ’15 has found a way to combine his interest in sports with his personable character, becoming a sports director for Paul Bunyan Broadcasting (part of Hubbard Broadcasting) in Bemidji, Minnesota.
On a day-to-day basis, Hoover is the on-air talent for the 10 a.m.-2 p.m. midday shift of 95.5 KZY, a current and variety music station. Additionally, his job includes recording noon sports reports for both the KZY music station and Paul Bunyan’s country station, KB101.
Hoover leads a busy life as he transfers from KZY in the morning to hosting “High Noon,” the local sports talk show, from noon to 2 p.m. on KBUN-FM 104.5. During the school year, he is also responsible for a large portion of the Lumberjack Radio Network play-by-play coverage of Bemidji High School sporting events. Hoover is the voice you hear cheering on the radio for the girls’ soccer team when a goal is scored and updating parents driving home from work about the latest football pass. He covers a multitude of events from football, to boys’ and girls’ soccer, girls’ volleyball, boys’ and girls’ basketball, boys’ and girls’ hockey, and baseball.
What type of person is right for a job like this?
Based off his career experience thus far, Hoover says wide varieties of skills are needed to be successful in this job. Being personable and good at interacting with people are the most important skills for the workplace and the community for which you broadcast. To accomplish the tasks that come with the job, having poise in a broadcasting setting is essential: being conversational, friendly, having a well-kept voice and being prepared for on-air discussion are all very important to doing the job well when you go live.
Jobs in media—even radio—require good writing and reading skills, as well. Being a good writer and reader not only prepares your material well for being on air, but also helps with creative delivery. Hoover shared that preparation is essential for covering live games. Even though they are faced paced, he has previous creative material, like an interesting story about a player on the team or facts about the game itself, at the ready. His notes are often very detailed in order to provide a thoughtful broadcast that is both insightful and enjoyable to listen to as a story.
How did Hoover go from a Messiah College student with a journalism major to an incredibly successful broadcaster and sports director? Messiah helped Hoover focus on developing tangible skills in many different forms of media—writing in particular—developing a relatively well-rounded worker. On-campus experiences broadcasting for Messiah Athletics on the radio, taking a work-study job in the Athletics Office, and many different jobs at the Pulse (Messiah’s student-run media hub) were all essential for gathering wide range of work opportunities. All the experiences Messiah offered helped prepare him for the variety of work his job entails. Most importantly, Messiah helped Hoover find his identity in Christ which is something he can take to the workplace.
“Messiah helped me to critically think about how to allow my Christian faith—the centerpiece of my life—to permeate through my personality in the workplace, my thinking in how I approach my job, my on-air persona, and how to interact with the people I am around,” he added.
Looking back, Hoover highly recommends students to put the time in to find on-campus and off-campus internship and work-study opportunities to gain experience. “Practice makes perfect,” he says. “Multiple experiences are not only resume builders but will also develop your skills. Taking a variety of classes that will allow for you to become a better writer and get comfortable being in both on-air and content development types of roles is helpful too. Be creative, as well!”