Leanne McCullough
lem001@marietta.edu

For the past few weeks, rumors have been flying around the Marietta Campus concerning the controversy over the student show, Offbeat. The Marcolian sat down with the individuals involved to get to the bottom of the discussion and discover what really happened.

What was Offbeat about?

Marilee Morrow, assistant professor of the Mass Media Department, describes Offbeat as a show about issues directly concerning students, saying that it “felt like I was hanging out with students listening to them talk.”

Many compared it to Saturday Night Live; Professor Jack Hillwig, Chairman of the Mass Media Department, describes it as “street comedy.” The hosts, Elicia Banks-Gabriel and Jessie Offenberger, aired episodes featuring skits that paralleled MTV’s “Room Raiders.” Other segments included Offenberger walking and a variety show. The show aired on Thursdays at 6:00 pm on Channel 15.

What happened?

Morrow describes the situation as she sees it: “to my understanding there were complaints about the banter.” Since Channel 15 airs in the Marietta community as well, complaints were received both from community members and faculty on campus relating to the content of the topics discussed.

Morrow says this is understandable since people “don’t know who the audience is.” It is questionable whether the show is geared to the community or the campus. Upon the Department of Communication and Media Studies’ decision to cancel the show, an advisory committee was established. “The committee was formed with the intention and responsibility to establish guidelines for all shows that appear on WCMO,” assures Hillwig.

The Department of Communication and Media Studies decided that it was in the best interest of the school and community for the show to air no longer in its current form. Offenberger believes the show was cancelled “because the right facts were not represented and the people that got to make the decisions were not open to hearing our side of the story and had their mind made up before we even got to say anything.”

Hillwig explained that “saying we pulled the show misrepresents what we did.” The Department decided that the show did not represent Marietta College in the kind of light in which it wants to be portrayed, establishing that Channel 15 is not just a college station, but a community station as well.

What are the results?

Hillwig says the students have the “opportunity to redo the show”; Morrow concurs, adding that “they just have to tweak what they do.”

The problem is not that of the hosts, but that of the banter being discussed. Offenberger, one of the show’s hosts, said “I would like to see the new committee that was formed because of us, not take out their closed-mindedness on the future students that would like to take on the task of actually making something of our boring college TV station and let them express themselves creatively.”

Mailing address: Marietta College Box A-20, Marietta, Ohio 45750-4000
Physical address: McKinney Media Center, 508 Putnam St, Marietta, Ohio
Phone: (740) 376-4555
E-mail: marc@marietta.edu