Digital Media Production and Sports Broadcasting teacher, Golden Steele, applied for two grants earlier this year, without much hope of receiving them, in order to produce game broadcasts and Bengal Update.
Steele and his students streamed Golden Throne,along with a few basketball games, on their YouTube channel. Two students would do the cameras, one would run the TriCaster and cut between different camera angles, one would do a play-by-play, and one would do color. It was a positive learning experience for students interested in a sports broadcasting career.
Bengal Update, which was previously delivered through the intercom during the first hour, is now broadcasted live during the second hour using the media production equipment.
In order to broadcast both LHS games and the Bengal Update, students would have to unhook all the equipment, including cameras, the TriCaster, and nearly everything used to run Bengal Update, transfer the equipment to the gym, rehook everything up and eventually at the end of the game, usually around 9:00 or 9:30 p.m., unhook everything again and rehook it in the green room to run Bengal Update the next morning.
“When you start unplugging that equipment that often, something is going to break at some point,” Steele said.
When confronted with this equipment shortage problem, broadcasting student Forrest Delka-Wicks started researching techniques other schools from around the country used. He noticed that one school in the Midwest used a semi-truck. Unfortunately for LHS, they did not have enough money to fund that. Quick to a solution, Delka-Wicks asked Steele to write some grants.
To their surprise, Steele was awarded the Local Education Program Fund for $10,000 and the Leading Idaho grant for $100,000, both of which he used to purchase more equipment.
When asked how he felt about the grants,broadcasting student Wesley Heiss said, “I think it really gives us a bigger opportunity and it shows the school what we can really produce.”