More than 200 hours of restored WEAA broadcasts are at the center of this week’s HBCU Radio Preservation Project gathering at Morgan State University in Baltimore, connecting a station’s recovered history with practical training for the people preserving radio’s next generation.
Radio World reported November 11 that a reception marked the return of 212 hours of digitized recordings documenting WEAA’s history since its 1977 launch. The preservation work also includes 16 oral-history interviews with figures associated with the station, including Kweisi Mfume, Karsonya “Kaye” Wise Whitehead and retired general manager Charles Shahid.
The project’s published program confirms that its third annual symposium takes place November 12 at Morgan State’s University Student Center, in partnership with WEAA, the university’s journalism school and the Earl S. Richardson Library. The program includes a livestream link.
The agenda moves from finding and making archival material accessible to the role of HBCU stations as learning laboratories, followed by a session on oral history and public engagement. Participants include Morgan State archivist Ida E. Jones, WEAA underwriting and development director Desmond Barlow, and project founding director Jocelyn Robinson.
For station managers, the useful lesson is the connection between preservation and access: recordings need descriptions, institutional stewardship and a way for people to find them. The symposium offers examples from stations and university archives working through those tasks.
Public access to an archive should not be confused with permission to rebroadcast its contents. Stations developing anniversary programs or educational projects should establish reuse rights for the specific recordings they select.
Prepared with AI assistance and source verification.