KOCA brings culture, philosophy to Laramie

Many UW students and community members have been influenced by Laramie radio. Specifically, the low-powered, volunteer based FM station 93.5 KOCA has been providing an outlet for creativity and culture for over a decade.

KOCA began as an attempt to bring Spanish music to the Hispanic community in Laramie and Chicano Studies has contributed to the station continuously.

“A group of us got together and decided there was a need for Spanish speaking radio, and that’s how I began to get involved,” Connie Coca, a long-time board member said. “I’ve been involved with the board doing different projects for 13 years, ever since the initial planning stages.”

The Chicano Studies program is involved with KOCA as Dr. Ed Munoz’s class on contemporary Chicano society. The second half of the class focuses on working with the station to put together a successful fundraising campaign. The students are broken into five committees: administrative, marketing, on-air, engineering and web page.

“It’s another way to learn. You get to see what it takes to run a project like this and become involved in the community,” sophomore Ian Waltman, a member of the administrative committee, said.

“The students really help pull everything together,” Rebecca Slaughter, the Board Chair of KOCA, said. “It’s profitable to us. We run as a volunteer based station, so they really helped us to get better organized.”

The class helps give students real world experience.  While most classes teach from a book, this independent study allows students to come to know their abilities, many of which they did not know they had.

“I feel this class has helped me find out how much goes into something like this. I’m a quiet and reserved person, so being on-air and improvising has helped me with my public speaking. It has shown me what I am capable of,” said senior Kyle Barger, member of the on-air committee and co-host of “Metamorphosis,” a show dedicated to the belief that good music is good music, regardless of genre.

Although KOCA allocates much of its time to Hispanic music, it has a variety of other programs featuring blues, talk shows and story hour for children, and they are always looking for additional programs.

“I feel there’s a misconception that KOCA is focused toward the Latino community. But it’s really about just bringing everyone together,” Barger said.

KOCA hosted a community dance for their 10th anniversary at the Ramada Inn Saturday. The proceeds went to benefit KOCA.

“We had a really good turnout; about 120 people came.  The music was really good and quite a few people stayed all night,” Slaughter said. “It was a diverse group that included all age groups. People came and felt comfortable; that’s what we’re about.”

Ramada donated the ballroom for the dance and the DJs volunteered their time and equipment. Guests could also enter a 50/50 raffle, bid on giant piñatas stuffed with candy or share in the giant cake celebrating KOCA’s anniversary.