KSDT is an online
college radio
Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produced ...
station which refers to itself as "fiercely independent
college radio
Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produced ...
". Its facilities are located on the campus of the
University of California, San Diego
The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego in communications material, formerly and colloquially UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California, United States. Es ...
in
La Jolla
La Jolla ( , ) is a hilly, seaside neighborhood in San Diego, California, occupying of curving coastline along the Pacific Ocean. The population reported in the 2010 census was 46,781. The climate is mild, with an average daily temperature o ...
.
KSDT is completely student-run and operated. Its community comprises staff members, DJs, interns, practice room members, and general fans. The station regularly conducts interviews and studio sessions with
San Diego
San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...
and
Southern California
Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural List of regions of California, region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Its densely populated coastal reg ...
artists, as well as hosts off-the-air
concerts
A concert, often known informally as a gig or show, is a live performance of music in front of an audience. The performance may be carried by a single musician, in which case it is sometimes called a recital, or by a musical ensemble such as an ...
,
open mics and
poetry readings
A poetry reading is a public oral recitation or performance of poetry. Reading poetry aloud allows the reader to express their own experience through poetry, changing the poem according to their sensibilities. The reader uses pitch and stress, an ...
. It publishes a quarterly
zine
A zine ( ; short for ''magazine'' or ''fanzine'') is, as noted on Merriam-Webster’s official website, a magazine that is a “noncommercial often homemade or online publication usually devoted to specialized and often unconventional subject ...
featuring pictures from recent events, music opinion pieces, and album reviews, as well as community art and poetry. It also is the flagship radio carrier of the
UC San Diego Tritons
The UC San Diego Tritons are the College athletics in the United States, intercollegiate athletic teams that represent the University of California, San Diego. The Tritons compete in NCAA Division I as a member of the Big West Conference (BWC).
...
athletic programs.
Organization

KSDT is a student-run
radio
Radio is the technology of communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 3 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmitter connec ...
station. Its staff, consisting of a
general manager
A general manager (GM) is an executive who has overall responsibility for managing both the revenue and cost elements of a company's income statement, known as profit & loss (P&L) responsibility. A general manager usually oversees most or all of ...
, promotions director,
two audio engineers,
programming director,
marketing director
A chief marketing officer (CMO), also called a chief brand officer (CBO), is a C-suite corporate executive responsible for managing marketing activities in an organization. The CMO leads brand management, marketing communications (including adverti ...
,
music director
A music director, musical director or director of music is a person responsible for the musical aspects of a performance, production, or organization. This would include the artistic director and usually chief conductor of an orchestra or concert ...
,
webmaster,
secretary
A secretary, administrative assistant, executive assistant, personal secretary, or other similar titles is an individual whose work consists of supporting management, including executives, using a variety of project management, program evalu ...
, media director,
sports broadcasting
The broadcasting of sports events (also known as a sportscast) is the live coverage of sports as a television program, on radio, and other broadcasting media. It usually involves one and more sports commentators describing events as they happen ...
director and
design director, are all required by KSDT's
charter
A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the ...
to be students at UCSD. Each staff member is required to maintain an
internship
An internship is a period of work experience offered by an organization for a limited period of time. Once confined to medical graduates, internship is used to practice for a wide range of placements in businesses, non-profit organizations and g ...
program, the largest of which being those for
audio engineering
Audio most commonly refers to sound, as it is transmitted in signal form. It may also refer to:
Sound
*Audio signal, an electrical representation of sound
* Audio frequency, a frequency in the audio spectrum
*Digital audio, representation of soun ...
and
graphic design
Graphic design is a profession, academic discipline and applied art that involves creating visual communications intended to transmit specific messages to social groups, with specific objectives. Graphic design is an interdisciplinary branch of ...
. Oversight is provided by the Associated Students (AS) and
UCSD administration.
The majority of the organization's staff and budget is devoted to providing a
public service
A public service or service of general (economic) interest is any service intended to address the needs of aggregate members of a community, whether provided directly by a public sector agency, via public financing available to private busin ...
to the surrounding communities by playing music and hosting programming not normally heard elsewhere; usually taking the form of music shows featuring
independent
Independent or Independents may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups
* Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States
* Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist ...
and
underground music
Underground music is music with practices perceived as outside, or somehow opposed to, Popular music, mainstream popular music culture. Underground styles lack the commercial success of popular music movements, and may involve the use of avant-g ...
from a variety of genres. While
indie
Indie is a short form of "independence" or "independent"; it may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
*Independent media, media free of influence by government or corporate interests
*Indie art, fine arts made by artists independent of commer ...
rock music
Rock is a Music genre, genre of popular music that originated in the United States as "rock and roll" in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of styles from the mid-1960s, primarily in the United States and the United Kingdo ...
and its many subgenres are consistently found being broadcast from KSDT, other genres such as
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...
,
blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...
,
electronic music
Electronic music broadly is a group of music genres that employ electronic musical instruments, circuitry-based music technology and software, or general-purpose electronics (such as personal computers) in its creation. It includes both music ...
,
ambient music
Ambient music is a genre of music that emphasizes Musical tone, tone and atmosphere over traditional Musical form, musical structure or rhythm. Often "peaceful" sounding and lacking Musical composition, composition, beat, and/or structured melod ...
,
experimental
An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs whe ...
,
hip hop
Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hip- ...
,
world
The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that Existence, exists. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the world as unique, while others talk ...
, and others can also be heard on-air. This is not indicative of any preference of music directors, but more on the makeup of its volunteer students
DJs and the communities they represent. Alongside the
Che Cafe, KSDT was a large part of the
San Diego Punk and Hardcore Scene during the 1970s and 1980s.
KSDT does feature an open-door policy for accepting volunteer student DJs. Any UC San Diego student can apply to be accepted into a quarter-long DJ training process, consisting of hands-on training as well as volunteer work. If training is completed, shows are then created in the next quarter for an hour-long time slot during the week.
KSDT also has a
recording studio
A recording studio is a specialized facility for Sound recording and reproduction, recording and Audio mixing, mixing of instrumental or vocal musical performances, spoken words, and other sounds. They range in size from a small in-home proje ...
, which runs under the responsibility of the audio engineers. It has mainly been used to record songs and demos for local acts and student musicians, as well as to teach for the audio engineering internship program.
Through the use of multiple online radio streams, KSDT broadcasts every UC San Diego basketball, baseball, softball, volleyball, soccer, and water polo home game, along with select road games. These broadcasts are presented under the branding of KSDT Sports.
History
Founded in 1967, KSDT originally was a
carrier current
Carrier current transmission, originally called wired wireless, employs guided low-power Radio frequency, radio-frequency signals, which are transmitted along electrical conductors. The transmissions are picked up by receivers that are either conne ...
and
FM cable radio
Cable radio is radio broadcasting into homes and businesses via a cable. This can be a coaxial cable used for television, or a telephone line. It is generally used for the same reason as cable TV was in its early days when it was "community ante ...
station broadcasting on campus and to local cable TV subscribers. Throughout its history, KSDT has tried multiple times to obtain a terrestrial
FM radio
FM broadcasting is a method of radio broadcasting that uses frequency modulation (FM) of the radio broadcast carrier wave. Invented in 1933 by American engineer Edwin Armstrong, wide-band FM is used worldwide to transmit high fidelity, high-f ...
license but failed due to strict
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains j ...
(FCC) broadcasting laws and its proximity to Mexico, whose stations occupy much of the usual US educational band. It continued to pursue this goal in the 1990s and early 2000s, although has recently preferred being an online station.
As a public service college radio station, the format was largely musical, with some
community access programming. Commercial-free, it received funding from the university.
In 1999 it moved to become an internet radio station. In 2000 and 2001, it split with its "
sister station
In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement.
Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...
" SRTV (student-run television).
Its current
mission statement
A mission statement is a short statement of why an organization exists, what its overall goal is, the goal of its operations: what kind of product or service it provides, its primary customers or market, and its geographical region of operation ...
in part "strives to promote independent music not available from other sources and works to help the San Diego Community as well."
The recording studio on its premises was used to record and broadcast live many independent bands such as aMiniature,
Rookie Card
A rookie card is a trading card that is the first to feature an athlete after that athlete has participated in the highest level of competition within their sport. Collecting, Collectors may value these first appearances more than subsequent card ...
,
Skeletor
Skeletor () is a fictional supervillain and the main antagonist of the ''Masters of the Universe'' franchise created by Mattel, serving as the archenemy of He-Man and usually depicted as a skull-faced, blue-skinned Magic_(supernatural)#Magicians, ...
,
The Locust
The Locust was an American hardcore punk band from San Diego, California, known for their mix of grindcore aggression and new wave experimentation.
The band has been noted for their use of insect costumes when performing live.
History
Prio ...
,
Estradasphere,
Dressy Bessy
Dressy Bessy is an indie rock band from Denver, Colorado led by songwriter, guitarist, and vocalist, Tammy Ealom. The band is associated with The Elephant 6 Recording Company, the Elephant Six Recording Company and shares guitarist John Hill (mus ...
,
The Robot Ate Me
The Robot Ate Me is an experimental indie rock band formed by Ryland Bouchard in 2002. The band has been through many distinct phases incorporating aspects of folk, jazz, psychedelia and avant-garde rock. Their critically acclaimed albums altern ...
,
Creedle
Creedle is an American rock band based in San Diego, California. They are most known for their three full length albums released on Cargo Music/Headhunter Records in the 1990s, along with numerous 7-inch singles. The band was primarily compose ...
, Sub Society, Milestone, etc.
Artists such as
Lemmy
Ian Fraser Kilmister (24 December 1945 – 28 December 2015), better known as Lemmy Kilmister or simply Lemmy, was a British musician. He was the founder, lead vocalist, bassist and primary songwriter of the metal band Motörhead, of which he ...
from
Motörhead
Motörhead () were an English rock music, rock band formed in London in 1975 by bassist and lead vocalist Lemmy Kilmister, guitarist Larry Wallis and drummer Lucas Fox. Kilmister was the primary songwriter and only constant member. The band a ...
,
Björk
Björk Guðmundsdóttir ( , ; born 21 November 1965), known mononymously as Björk, is an Icelandic singer, songwriter, composer, record producer, and actress. Noted for her distinct voice, three-octave vocal range, and eccentric public per ...
,
The Flaming Lips
The Flaming Lips are an American psychedelic rock band formed in 1983 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The band currently consists of Wayne Coyne (vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards), Steven Drozd (guitars, bass, keyboards, drums, vocals), Derek Brown ...
,
The Meat Puppets
''The'' is a grammatical article in English, denoting nouns that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The ...
,
Screaming Trees
Screaming Trees were an American rock band formed in Ellensburg, Washington, in 1984 by vocalist Mark Lanegan, guitarist Gary Lee Conner, bassist Van Conner, and drummer Mark Pickerel. Pickerel was replaced by Barrett Martin in 1991. Screami ...
,
Mogwai
Mogwai () are a Scottish post-rock band, formed in 1995 in Glasgow. The band consists of Stuart Braithwaite (guitar, vocals), Barry Burns (guitar, piano, synthesizer, vocals), Dominic Aitchison (bass guitar), and Martin Bulloch (drums). Mogwa ...
,
Fugazi
Fugazi (; ) is an American post-hardcore band formed in Washington, D.C., in 1986. The band consists of guitarists and vocalists Ian MacKaye and Guy Picciotto, bassist Joe Lally, and drummer Brendan Canty. They were noted for their style-transc ...
, and others have recorded station identifications for KSDT in the past.
When UC San Diego began its transition to the Division I level of NCAA competition in 2020, KSDT began occasionally broadcasting live sporting events for UC San Diego athletics. For the 2023-24 school year, the station received funding to begin a formalized sports broadcasting program, complete with a director position and an internship. Through the founding of this program, KSDT's sports coverage grew to broadcasting every home game for NCAA sponsored team sports, a weekly sports show, and an independent social media presence for KSDT Sports.
With the 2024-25 NCAA season being the first in which UC San Diego could qualify for postseason competition, the brand of KSDT Sports became a significant storyline in relation to the
Triton men's basketball team when the broadcasting program organized upwards of 300 students to drive up to
UC Irvine
UC may refer to:
Education
In the United States
* University of California system
* University of Charleston, West Virginia
* University of Chicago, Illinois
* University of Cincinnati, Ohio
* Upsala College, East Orange, New Jersey (''defunct ...
as a part of an event known as "Operation Invade Irvine" to attend the Tritons road game on February 8th, a game with major ramifications for both the Tritons and
Anteaters
Anteaters are the four extant mammal species in the suborder Vermilingua (meaning "worm tongue"), commonly known for eating ants and termites. The individual species have other names in English and other languages. Together with sloths, they ar ...
in their season-long battle to win the
Big West Conference
The Big West Conference (BWC) is an American collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference whose member institutions participate in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's NCAA Division I, Division I. The conference was origina ...
and qualify to
March Madness
The NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, branded as March Madness, or The Big Dance, is a single-elimination tournament played in the United States to determine the men's college basketball national champion of the NCAA Division I, Di ...
. After the Tritons won in dominant fashion, the night of both the fan invasion and game itself was declared the greatest night in UC San Diego sporting history.
The Tritons would go on to win the Big West regular season in men's basketball and qualify for their first ever March Madness in both men's and women's basketball. Both March Madness debuts were broadcast by KSDT Sports, despite the games taking place during finals week of winter quarter. In the post-game press conference after the men's team was eliminated,
finalist and star guard Hayden Gray credited KSDT Sports with having shifted the fan culture at UC San Diego.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=os491cPzIbw&t=639s]
References
External links
Official WebsiteZineAssociated Students of UCSD - KSDT
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ksdt Radio
SDT
Freeform radio stations
Internet radio stations in the United States
SDT Radio
University and college mass media in the United States
University of California, San Diego
Defunct radio stations in the United States
Radio stations established in 1968
1968 establishments in California