News Release

North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC
makes changes to on-air schedule

CHAPEL HILL – Starting Monday (Aug. 8), listeners to North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC (91.5 FM) will notice several changes to the station’s weekly on-air schedule.

The biggest change will be on weekday mornings. WBUR/Boston will no longer produce The Connection with Dick Gordon, a program that aired live on North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon for the past four years. In its place, WUNC will air The Diane Rehm Show.

For more than 25 years, The Diane Rehm Show, produced at WAMU/Washington, DC, has offered listeners thoughtful and lively conversations on an array of topics with many of the most distinguished people of our times. Each week, more than 1.4 million listeners across the country tune in to the program, making it one of public broadcasting’s most-listened-to programs. Diane’s guests have included many of the nation’s top newsmakers, journalists and authors, from former president Bill Clinton, to Archbishop Desmond Tutu, to Julie Andrews. Each show includes dialogue with listeners who call to take part in an exchange of ideas.

"Dick Gordon was a popular host and a favorite of WUNC listeners, so we are sad to see him go," said George Boosey, the station’s program director. "However, we have taken this change as an opportunity to address feedback from our listeners, consult with other public broadcasters and examine the latest radio research, and as a result we have selected a program that we believe our listeners will enjoy and find valuable."

In response to input from listeners to WUNC and its affiliate stations, several other changes are being made to the North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC schedule, also starting Monday (Aug. 8):

• On weeknights, WUNC will broadcast The World at 7 p.m. and an encore broadcast of the popular Fresh Air with Terry Gross at 8 p.m. (Fresh Air will continue to air weekdays at 3 p.m.) These programs replace WBUR’s On Point with Tom Ashbrook, which will no longer be available for live broadcast.

The World, which is co-produced by the BBC World Service, Public Radio International and WGBH Radio Boston, is a one-hour show offering a mix of news, features, interviews, and music from around the globe. Hosted by Lisa Mullins, it is the first global radio news program developed specifically for an American audience and presents listeners with a different perspective of the world’s people, events and trends.

• On Sundays at 7 a.m., North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC introduces a new program, Marketplace Money, hosted by Kai Ryssdal. Like the Marketplace program that airs weekdays at 6:30 p.m., Marketplace Money looks at the world through the lens of business and economics. This personal finance program applies Marketplace’s style and expertise to take an intelligent, interesting and informed look at the effect money has on people and, in turn, what affects people’s money. In the process, it educates listeners to help them take control of their financial lives.
  
• On weekends, This American Life with Ira Glass will now be heard Fridays at 7 p.m., in addition to its regularly scheduled broadcast Saturdays at 3 p.m. Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me!, the popular news quiz show, will now air twice each weekend: Saturdays at 2 p.m. and Sundays at 11 a.m. On The Media is moving to a new broadcast time, Sundays at 3 p.m.

North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC is a service of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, broadcasting at 91.5 FM in the Triangle and Triad, at 90.9 FM in Rocky Mount/Wilson and at 88.9 FM on the Outer Banks.

For more information on our program schedule, visit www.wunc.org. 

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Note: Boosey can be reached at: (919) 966-5454 or gboosey@wunc.org.

News Services contact: Lisa Katz, (919) 962-2093 or lisa_katz@unc.edu