So, five years have passed and the Hedda podcast has become more than anyone initially thought it would become. With thousands of people tuning in, with experts around the world being interviewed about the world of higher education. To shed some light on the very beginning of the podcast, we asked Shane Colvin (who is still running the technical side here) about his thoughts and rationale for starting up the podcast series, and we also asked Leasa Weimer who was the blog editor until 2010 about what she remembers from the early days of the Hedda podcasts.
Shane Colvin
(University of Oslo)
Shane: I have always enjoyed listening to talk radio. Perhaps that is an understatement; I was literally obsessed with listening to talk radio whilst growing up. I thought it was absolutely amazing consuming all that information and hearing different perspectives on the latest news, politics and the economy. Best of all, I was listening while doing the most mundane and tedious of tasks, such as sitting in traffic, waiting at the airport, cleaning the house or even going for a long run.
Then in 1999, when I moved to Norway, I was dismayed when I could no longer listen to my favorite talk radio shows. This might sound crazy, but in order to fill the void in my life, I had my mother record my favorite talk radio shows and send me week-long recordings on cassette tapes so I could listen to them on my 1990’s Sony Walkman. In fact I would listen to them over and over until the next tapes would arrive in the mail.
If I recall correctly, it was in 2001,when I learned about the opportunity to listen to some of the talk radio stations back home by streaming them live on the internet. Unfortunately due to the time difference between Norway and the US, I was unable to listen to the shows I enjoyed in the past. It was finally around 2003 when a wave of “talk show” recordings (not yet called podcasts) became available and the ability to subscribe to them via an RSS fixed some of the practical problems I had before.
However, it was in 2005 when iTunes made listening to podcasts even easier by making it possible to subscribe to countless shows and to synchronize them with my iPod automatically. I could now listen to whatever I wanted, wherever I wanted. Shortly after iTunes was launched, iTunes U was established as a collection of free on-line lectures in both audio and video from some of the best universities in the world. This gave me the idea of also podcasting here at Faculty of Educational Sciences at the University of Oslo, where Hedda resides and where I worked as an IT engineer.
Fortunately Professor Peter Maassen was also very enthusiastic about the idea of making the lectures available to our students. Hence with his approval the initial podcasts were born, and we ended up being one of the first programs at the University of Oslo to podcast all lectures. After the podcasting of classroom lectures began to function smoothly, we then moved on to podcasting international guests giving lectures at conferences and seminars.
Leasa Weimer
(University of Jyväskylä / EMA Association)
Leasa: Shane should receive accolades for planting the seed of starting the podcast series. In April 2009, we were filming some of the lectures and posting them for the students. This got us (mostly Shane) thinking about the hot trend of video podcasts. We discussed the idea of interviewing visiting professors with the intention of making the blog “come to life!”
Shane: I thought it would be far more interesting to hear from these experts outside of the traditional lecture environment, where we would sit down with them, then pose our own questions related to their research and current trends in higher education. I happened to have soundproof studio room down the hall from my office and it was never actually used. I thought the room would be the perfect place to conduct professional podcasts with our academic staff and international guests. In 2009 I asked Jason Wertz, who as a master student in higher education program to help me produce the first podcasts with the interview format. Although he had no experience in radio, it turns out that Jason had a fantastic voice for podcast interviews. He was also very good at researching the guests in order to prepare the appropriate and relevant questions.
The first podcasts we produced were actually inspired by one of my favorite podcasts series: BBC History Magazine. They would interview two or more guest on various historical topics, as well as have short sound bites at the beginning of the podcast and music to go along. I remember Jason and I spending lots of time trying to find the “right” music for the Hedda podcasts. Given that we had no budget the music came from a free on-line music source, which did not offer the best music but it had to do. I also recall in the early days using far more time editing each of the podcasts, yet as time when on we became more efficient at producing the podcasts.
A while later, we were fortuitous enough to have Lease Weimer, a former student, conducting podcast interviews while she was abroad in England and Finland pursuing her PhD. Never would we have imagined that the Hedda podcast series would have expanded in this way, we now had international correspondent.
Leasa: At this time, I was also working as the blog editor from afar, pursuing my PhD at the University of Georgia-Athens in the U.S., so all of our meetings and correspondence was mostly via email and Skype. In the fall of 2009 I was a visiting student at Oxford in the U.K. and I took this opportunity to meet with and interview some of the big name higher education researchers in the U.K. for the podcast series. The interview I remember the most was with Bahram Bekhradnia, he was such a pleasure to meet with and genuinely interested in being part of the podcast series. I also traveled to Bath and Sheffield to interview a few others, so it also allowed me to experience a few other higher education research groups.
The series was a constant work in progress as we learned how best to format the introduction, questions, and conclusion of each podcast and how to technically frame it on the blog. We always joked that Jason’s voice was so soft on the ears that his voice alone drew in an audience.
Shane: In 2010, we were pleased to have Mari Elken join the Hedda team as the editor and she subsequently took over for Jason when conducting the podcast interviews. Mari has become the driving force behind the Hedda blog and podcasts, in truth taking it to a whole new level. She also started using Skype to produce the interviews thereby put us in contact with researchers from around the world. No longer do we need guests to come here to the soundproof room down the hall. We can now interview experts wherever they are by simply record the Skype sessions. Another key player in recent years has also been Kristi Barcus, who not only is crucial when it comes to the blog but also contributes to the planning, editing of the podcast, especially the student podcasts.
Ultimately we started the Hedda podcasts five years ago to have some fun. We had no funding and very little support but we yearned to produce quality podcasts that an international audience interested in international higher education would enjoy listening to. I hope we manage to do that and deliver more in future. I am truly looking forward to seeing what the Hedda Team will accomplish in the next 5 years.
Leasa: I continue to follow the hedda blog and podcast series and am proud of how it has developed through the years. Off the record: You all are doing an AWESOME job!!!