KOCE-TV May Become a Television Academy

KOCE-TV (Channel 50) in Huntington Beach, Orange County’s only Public Broadcasting System station, might become a “television academy” for training college students, Coast Community College District officials disclosed Monday.

If the proposal is approved, the college district will drop its plans to divest itself of the television station’s license.

Instead, the three colleges in the district--Golden West in Huntington Beach, Coastline Community College headquartered in Fountain Valley, and Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa--would use the multimillion-dollar, modern TV broadcast studios of KOCE-TV as the biggest telecommunications training center in Orange County. The station would continue to broadcast PBS programs.

The television academy would use the Emmy Award-winning TV studio to train students in all phases of television and video production and broadcasting, college officials said. The station won three Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards in June for the score of one program, for outstanding instructional special and for outstanding instructional series.

The station is on the Golden West College campus in Huntington Beach but is independent of the college. While the current value of the KOCE-TV buildings and equipment was not available Monday, a 1982 audit said fixed assets totaled $6.4 million.

“This would be a way of making very good use of all those television facilities,” said Nancy Pollard, president of the Coast Community College District Board of Trustees. “We think the television academy would become financially self-sufficient. As for not divesting ourselves of the station, well, that’s never been written in stone.”

KOCE-TV is owned by the college district. The station became a political issue in 1983 when Pollard and two other candidates for the board of trustees, Armando Ruiz and Conrad Nordquist, charged that the incumbent board was spending too much on the station at the expense of general education in the three colleges.

After Pollard, Ruiz and Nordquist were elected in November, 1983, they voted for a professional study of district operations, including KOCE-TV. That study, by Evans Management Services Inc. of Santa Monica, recommended that the college district gradually reduce its financial support of the TV station and divest itself of the station’s operation by transferring its license.

The new board of trustees, in the summer of 1984, accepted the recommendation and voted to reduce funding for KOCE-TV each year and to seek a new public-interest group to take over the station’s license by 1987. The proposed divestiture, however, was only for license and operation; it never proposed that the college district sell the studios and equipment.

“Because of our fiduciary responsibilities--the public trust--we legally can’t just sell all the buildings and equipment,” Pollard said. “This proposal is a way we could make use of them without costing the district any more money.”

KOCE-TV currently broadcasts Public Broadcasting System programs, televised courses (telecourses) offered by Coastline Community College, and some locally produced TV shows. The operation is by professionals and not by students.

Chancellor David Brownell confirmed Monday that he has given the five-member board of trustees a proposed outline of a new television academy to operate from the KOCE-TV buildings. He said PBS programs would continue to be broadcast.

“This would allow the district maximum use of the facilities and equipment, which are things that are already paid for,” Brownell said. “Furthermore, I believe that enrollment and grants would generate a net profit; the district would make more money than it would spend on a television academy.”

In his written proposal to the board, Brownell said that the television academy, when fully operational, would attract up to 300 full-time students.

Brownell’s proposal is scheduled to be considered, but not voted on, at the Jan. 22 board of trustees meeting.

Under his proposal, Coastline Community College would administer the television academy and classes would begin in the fall of 1986.

The proposed curriculum would consist of “core courses,” such as “television studio operations,” coupled with specialty subjects in three career areas, commercial broadcasting, cable TV and business-industry TV and video.

Students could opt to work toward a certificate or associate of arts degree, or transfer to a four-year university for completion of a bachelor’s degree, Brownell said.

Brownell said the TV-video market is booming, and jobs increasingly will be available in the industry. “There is more home video equipment in Orange County, for instance, than in any county in the United States,” he said.

Terry Bales, telecommunications/journalism director at Rancho Santiago Community College, said Monday that majors in television also are offered in his college district and in Saddleback and North Orange County Community College districts.

“Fullerton College has courses, we have them and so does Saddleback College” Bales said. “We’ve been offering courses to Golden West College students through an arrangement we (in Rancho Santiago College) have.”

Bales said he did not think a new telecommunications program in Orange County would necessarily be excessive, but he said questioned the job market.

“There’ll be enough students to run the schools, but as far as jobs go, that’s a different story,” said Bales. “There’s tough competition for the jobs.”

Bales, however, acknowledged that the video industry is growing in Orange County. “One survey showed there are 200 video-production companies in Orange County,” he said.

Brownell, the Coast district chancellor, said that much of the anticipated market for telecommunications students in Orange County would be in the growth fields of cable TV, video, and business-industry use of telecommunications.