Best of the Best: WPTS Radio wins national award

WPTS Radio beat nine other college radio station finalists to win a national award over the weekend. 

MTV’s sister station catering to college audiences, mtvU, awarded WPTS 92.1 — Pitt’s student radio station — the College Radio Woodie during the 2015 mtvU Woodie Awards on Friday, March 20. Since the first show in 2004, mtvU has awarded the College Radio Woodie every year to “pioneering stations dedicated to bringing students the best emerging music,” according an MTV press release. 

Jack Antonoff, lead singer and songwriter for the Bleachers and lead guitarist for the band Fun., hosted this year’s award show, which was part of the South by Southwest music, film and interactive festivals that ran from March 13 to March 22. 

This year’s win was WPTS’ first Woodie. Last year another Pennsylvania college radio station, East Stroudsburg University’s WESS 90.3, won the award. The radio station qualified for the event in 2009, 2012 and 2013, but did not win the Woodie in those three years. 

“We’re the best college radio station in the country,” said Rachel Mauer, WPTS Radio station manager. “There was never a doubt in my mind.” 

Mauer said she was active with WPTS when the station qualified for the Woodies in both 2012 and 2013, which left her “hungry” for the award. 

The competing radio stations must excel in three tiers, according to Mauer, to compete for the Woodie. For the first tier, mtvU studies how often the radio station reports the songs they play to the College Music Journal, which compiles the information, and The Princeton Review, which ranks the stations based off that information.

For the second tier, mtvU studies how active the college stations are on their websites and social media. 

For the third and final tier, mtvU examines the stations’ presence on Ratemyprofessor.com. The website is owned by Viacom, the same company that owns MTV. 

Mauer attributed this year’s win to the extra push the station gave to Pitt students to vote for WPTS. Members of the station’s staff reached out to students through an Instagram, Twitter and Facebook campaign. 

Listeners voted on the mtvU website. Voting opened Feb. 18, the same day the station learned they made the list of nominees, and closed March 10. 

WPTS hosted unique events throughout the year, including a 24-hour radiothon, which consisted of speciality programming such as yoga, karaoke, live band performances, a guest appearance by Carnegie Mellon University’s WRCT station and a play-by-play of the station’s staff playing Mario Kart. During the event, which lasted Jan. 9 to Jan. 10., Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto also made an hour-long appearance during the radiothon. He compiled a playlist of his favorite songs for the show, which included Andrew Bird’s “Near Death Experience Experience” and the Pixies’ cover of “Head On.”

Other top contenders this year for the College Radio Woodie awards included stations from Boston University, University of California, Berkeley and Arizona State University. 

“I’m ecstatic that we won,” Mauer said. “We work hard every year, but we worked especially hard this year. I’m very proud of my staff.”