WQFS is Guilford College's student-run radio station, with both students and members of the community serving as disk jockeys. Broadcasting in a variety format, it serves Greensboro, North Carolina and the greater Piedmont Triad area. It is also broadcast on the internet via streaming audio at TuneIn. WQFS is currently ranked number six in the Princeton Review's "The Best 378 Colleges." The station has maintained a spot in the contest's top ten for seven consecutive years. In October 2008, Greensboro News & Record's Go Triad also named WQFS as the Triad's Best College Radio Station.
History
The station started as a student club, The Fine Music Broadcasting Society, in 1965. Guilford obtained a license from the FCC on October 26, 1966 and, once it had the necessary equipment and funds, WQFS began a daily broadcast schedule on January 6, 1970, broadcasting in an adult contemporary or middle of the road format. By its second year of operation, some disk jockeys began to play what a decade later would become known as college rock. Others would play hybrid programming, which could feature avant-garde jazz, contemporary classical, bluegrass, blues, and Musique concrète, sometimes all within the same program. One early experiment involved celebrating the second anniversary of the Paul is dead hoax by playing not only Beatles, but other rock, and even classical records backwards, or using the station's two turntables to play a Beatles song forwards and backwards at the same time. Like many college stations, WQFS currently features a wide variety of genres, all with a strong focus on independent music labels. The main format is indie rock. About one hundred DJs, half of them students, work at the station at any given time. Students also hold the management positions, which change frequently. WQFS plays many local artists such as Low Sky, Resister, Decoration Ghost, and Workday/Schoolnight. Long-running shows include David Butler's "The Sunday Morning Rehab Show"; Wesley Elam's "Flava Lab" on Thursday evenings; Josh Neas' "J's Indie Rock Mayhem" on Friday mornings; DJ Midnightt's "Garden of Good and Evil" on Tuesday evenings; Chris Roulhac's "North Carolina Show" on Wednesday afternoons; and Sherrill "Mad Dog" Ward's "Friday Night Rock Party." WQFS is currently ranked as the sixth best college radio station in the country by the Princeton Review. In the past the station has held spots as high as number 4. Currently, Kate Nunke serves as General Manager, Anna Fox as Programming Manager, Jake Fetzer and Mick Mahony as Music Managers, Addie Ronis and Abijah Gattis as Promotions Managers, DaeQuan Cancio-Fitzgerald as Production and News Manager, and Cristina Gaviria as Social Media Manager.
Programming
Alphabetical listing of programs airing on WQFS as of February 2016, all independently produced and hosted by volunteer disc jockeys unless otherwise noted:
