JCTV (Jesuit Crusader Television) is Jesuit’s student-led broadcast service. JCTV’s primary goals are to showcase Jesuit student athletes as well as giving Jesuit students the opportunity to work on broadcasts.
You may have seen a broadcast on Youtube, whether it be a big friday night football game or a Metro League title deciding basketball game. You see the broadcast, but have you ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes before and after the cameras turn on?
Mr. Dan Falkner has been the Student Media Coordinator and Teacher for the past 4 years. He teaches the student media classes at Jesuit as well as helping run JCTV and Jesuit Media.
“It started in 2012 as a student club in which they would get together and broadcast events and games on campus,” said Falkner on how JCTV started. Since then JCTV has only grown. JCTV now has 4.39K subscribers on YouTube.
The actual broadcast process starts long before a ball is kicked or a basketball is bounced. Identifying which games to broadcast is a big part of running a successful channel.
With so many games in each season and only limited ability to broadcast, it can be a challenge to find the right games.
“During media days we will put out a sheet with the schedule of the teams,” Falkner said. JCTV also identifies games looking back at what happened the year prior or talking with coaches.
Next comes the spreadsheet: a spreadsheet is created and shared with the media classes where anyone can sign up for any role. The roles are camera operator[s], producer, and two announcers. The beauty of JCTV is that the only reason it is successful is because of student participation. All games are recorded, produced and announced by active Jesuit students.
Lastly is the actual live game broadcast.
Sophomore Liam Baluyut announced a football game as well as two Men’s Lacrosse games in the spring.
“Mr. Powers or Mr. Falkner will walk you through what you have to do, then the broadcast starts,” said Baluyut.
“Before my first game I was nervous, but as time went on I settled in,” said Baluyut.
The broadcast is called live by two announcers. The announcers talk about the game with one doing color and one doing play by play. The producer controls the actual broadcast including switching camera angles, changing microphone volume, and adding graphics at pauses. For most games there are two broadcast cameras but it depends on the game and venue. There is a “main broadcast” camera from a standard angle. The other camera is on the field to provide variety throughout the broadcast with more zoomed in shots from separate angles.
There is always a new challenge faced during each broadcast whether it be batteries dying, the digital scoreboard not working, or the microphones not working. The JCTV crew has to still find a way to produce the game despite these challenges.
JCTV’s most viewed broadcast of all time was the community celebration assembly from 2022. This assembly is sitting at over 11k views on YouTube. This was one of the first big assemblies since covid at Jesuit so that could be a leading reason on why it has picked up so many views over the years. One of the primary jobs of JCTV is to broadcast school events like these big assemblies from parents to watch from home.
JCTV is always free on YouTube and is a great way to watch a Jesuit sporting event well supporting your classmates who are broadcasting. If you ever would like to be involved in a broadcast JCTV is always needing extra helping hands and feel free to contact Mr. Falkner.
