School radio station KHWS inspired students at four other schools to start their own school-wide radio stations in recent months. A mix of students and faculty from Oakwood, Brentwood, Marlborough, and Beverly Hills High School have worked with Sam Wolk ’13, a founding member of KHWS, to figure out how to navigate the technical skills required to broadcast and how to work with a school’s administration to found a station and how to encourage listeners to tune in.

“People don’t just listen, and traffic tends to trickle as the months go on,” said Daniel Sunshine ’13, another founding member of KHWS.

He said that staying confident is key to sustaining a radio project through the long process of approval and as numbers of listeners vary. A few of Wolk’s friends at Oakwood recently launched their radio station, KO, which Wolk said was entirely modeled after KHWS. He primarily helped them with tech support for the program Live 365, which both KO and KHWS use. It allows DJ’s from different computers to play songs and pays the musicians to whom songs are attributed.

“The thing they have to realize [is] that if you really want to make this happen and make it successful, you are going to have to put a lot of work and a lot of time into it,” Wolk said. “It has to be something you want to spend your time doing.”

A faculty adviser from Brentwood contacted Director of Student Affairs Jordan Church to ask about KHWS and how the project started. Church put him into contact with Wolk, who has since met with advisers and students. Wolk said that once they determine how involved the administration will be with their station, he will continue to help with technical support. Though Sunshine said the average number of listeners for KHWS ranges from 10-20, Wolk said he is very happy with the success of the station considering the website has had 80,000 page views and most college stations average 30 an hour.