Student Media Alumni Takeover Poster The Xavierite
The Department of Student Media announced they will be hosting their second annual Student Media Alumni Takeover event during Homecoming week, Oct. 14–20.
Peter Kreten, Director of Student Media, established the event last year in hopes of creating a larger sense of community by bringing together the alums and current staff of WXAV 88.3FM and The Xavierite to connect on experiences and nostalgic memories of the past.
Kreten, an alumni of WXAV, recounts what lead to the idea of creating the alumni takeover event, “For me and a lot of my friends, being involved with WXAV was some of the best times of our life and I wanted to open it up where we could relive those days again,” he says. “It was the idea of getting everyone to come back and relive those really fun experiences while meeting the current staff.”
During takeover week, alums will revisit the media center to tour around WXAV and The Xavierite as they’ve been remodeled. Past writers of The Xavierite will be able to write an article in the newsroom and look over the recent achievements of the paper while meeting the current staff, while alums of WXAV will be able to find themselves back on the broadcasting desk to once again revisit making their favorite past shows with other radio alumnus.
“I think that was probably the biggest thing, was being able to do shows with long time friends with whom I haven’t really done radio with in a number of years and being able to do that again was just a blast,” continues Kreten. “It was fun and it made me smile. It was like reliving the glory days.”
Kreten recalls the moment when longtime college friends and alums of WXAV (Kev Kellam and Chris Puchmelter) had produced and aired a show together, something they haven’t done since they were undergraduates.
Kreten mentions that after the alumni takeover event ended last year, he received messages from many of those that had attended and exclaimed how happy and how much fun they had. “A lot of people were just flooded back with a lot of memories,” he says. “ It was like a family reunion with a lot of people you might not see on a regular basis but you always have a connection with them.”
“It was fun, seeing all the alums smiling. It was like the biggest reward for me because we all got to relive the best part of our undergraduate lives”.
As the alums from over the years have returned and joined together with the current staff of the media center, it can bring out the best of possibilities and creativity when additionally learning more about hosting radio shows or writing articles for the newspaper, says Kreten.
“Come back and relive the glory days. Come back home and have a good time,” Kreten says.
Mark your calendars, bring your creativity, we’ll give you nostalgia, and let’s take a time machine back to create some fun entertainment!
Reservations are required to attend Student Media Alumni Takeover as spots are becoming limited, so please register immediately. Our sign ups are a first come, first serve basis.
For more information or questions, please contact Kreten, you can email him at pkreten@sxu.com or call at (773)-298-3375. For additional information please visit the WXAV or The Xavierite website.
Correction: On September 12th, this column was edited for grammar error.