Spectrum - Volume 21 Issue 07 October 8, 1998 - Student media form new corporation

A non-profit publication of the Office of the University Relations of Virginia Tech,
including The Conductor , a special section of the Spectrum printed 4 times a year

Student media form new corporation

By Liz Crumbley

Spectrum Volume 21 Issue 07 - October 8, 1998

After a decade of studies and deliberations, the student media organizations of Virginia Tech have incorporated. In 1998, the Bugle, Collegiate Times , photography staff, Silhouette , VTTV, and WUVT joined forces as the Educational Media Company at Virginia Tech (EMCVT), a non-profit corporation with its own board of directors and accounting system.

"The day-to-day operations of the student media remain the same," said Brian McGuire, a former university Student Affairs employee who served as chair of the former Student Media Board and is now general manager of EMCVT. "We still have offices in Squires and produce the same products we always have. We have incorporated into a non-profit organization devoted to educational purposes, much like Virginia Tech itself. The university has a strong interest in keeping the corporation as part of the academic community."
Several years ago, Virginia Tech began changing the way student organizations were classified. The student media already were considering the possibility of incorporation, a move that media have made at numerous schools throughout the U.S.
The EMCVT board of directors includes members from the student media as well as university faculty members and legal and accounting professionals from the Blacksburg area. A member also is selected from student media alumni. Each media organization continues to have its own editor/manager, business manager, and faculty adviser, and these people comprise the EMCVT management advisory team.
"This reorganization clarifies the mutually beneficial relationship between the student media and Virginia Tech," McGuire said. "The media still are major facets of student life at Tech and always will be." Student-media alumni interested in learning more about EMCVT or participating as supporters may call McGuire at 1-4054.