There are lots of different ways SRCs and students can communicate with and connect to their student communities and cohorts. The Melbourne High School SRC recently created their own podcast, The Dukebox, and have curated a few tips to help you create your own Student Podcast.
You’ll need a team to help you
Creating a podcast requires putting in a lot of work behind the scenes to get it up and running. Having a team working with you means that you can rotate the workload and have different people working on different episodes of the podcast, to be more efficient.
Get brainstorming!
When you get in the rhythm of creating podcast episodes, it can be hard to think of and new topics and ideas to talk about. Brainstorming a list of potential topics you could talk about is helpful if you’re stuck for ideas, because you have something you can refer to in the future. Also, don’t be afraid to reach out to fellow students for ideas and suggestions on what to talk about.
Look into different software/tech
There is a variety of software and technologies that you will need to create a podcast. For example, you will need something to record your podcasts with, to edit the audio together, put sound effects and music in, and upload the files so people can listen to it. We recommend using Anchor, an easy-to-use podcast software that can help you edit and upload your podcasts to Spotify.
Choose where to upload your podcast
Have a think about which platforms students at your school use to access podcasts the most. For example, heaps of students might already listen to music on Spotify, or perhaps prefer having video to accompany the podcast, so YouTube might be better. It might also be a good idea to think about the best way to post/advertise your podcast. Potentially this might involve posting on your school’s online management system (e.g. Compass), or using Instagram or Facebook.
Think about your target audience
Consider which year levels you expect to listen to your podcasts. If it is for all students, consider having students from all year levels feature on the podcast, to engage the whole student community. If you’re organizing this as an SRC team or a leadership team, consider getting students outside of your team to be involved in the podcasts, either as hosts or guests.
Interact with your audience!
You could include questions or activities of the week in your podcast and take suggestions from students in your podcast. You may want to interview students/staff in your school about relevant issues and their opinions. There may also be specific issues or topics that a lot of students are thinking about that needs to be discussed and/or addressed, and your podcast is a perfect opportunity to do so!
Be realistic with your time commitment
Running a podcast is not easy and it can be quite difficult to maintain the time commitment. You might find running it every week a bit difficult, so you may want to consider posting less frequently. Try to make sure the time frame you choose for uploading your podcast doesn’t overwhelm or overload you.
That’s all folks! We hope that provides some insight and advice on creating your own student podcast and best of luck.