Local Nebraska high school sports enthusiast Greg Mays recently began his adventure into the world of Internet podcasts. Mays currently hosts Suiting Up Varsity: Nebraska High School Sports History, a weekly podcast that debuted Aug. 22.
Mays started making a podcast to help improve his teaching skills,
“I’m always looking for new projects and try to do realistic writing because I think it helps me in teaching kids writing,” Mays said.
One of the reasons Mays chose to do a podcast specifically was because of the evolution of writing from words to audio and visual creations,
“So many of the things being produced for the internet, which is really writing, is being experienced through audio and video,” Mays said.
To help expose his students to the many different forms of writing, Mays cut out one of his classes’ writing assignments a couple years back, and replaced it with a filmmaking project.
The inspiration for the topic of the podcast came from an old book Mays enjoyed back in high school,
“There was this book on Nebraska high school sports history that I loved. I checked it out constantly. The guy who wrote it tried to do a second edition of the book but ran into legal troubles and died before finishing it. I’ve wanted to do the next edition of this book, but instead I decided to do a podcast,” Mays said.
A lot of planning and work goes into each episode of Suiting Up Varsity,
“I started writing them this summer to try and get ahead. I got to the point where I had written eight episodes ahead. It takes about three to four days of working for an hour or two to write them. Once they’re written and I learned how to record them, I’m able to get them recorded pretty quick,” Mays said.
Mays isn’t alone in researching the topics that go into making an episode. He also enlists the help of his younger brother when he has a specific question.
Mays initially recorded one episode and sent it to a local audio expert,
“I sent my first episode to Chris Schuckei, who used to work at Channel 5 and David Letterman. I told him to be brutal, tell me what I’m doing wrong here, what do I have to change, and he gave me some suggestions,” Mays said.
Schuckei told Mays to start adding music, and then he started experimenting in Garageband.
As of right now, Suiting Up Varsity is released weekly on Mondays, but that may change to accommodate Mays’ schedule,
“I’m starting to come up on my buffer, I’m only two episodes ahead right now. I’ve gotta work a little further ahead, because when basketball season that could be trouble. We’ll see, I may have to start releasing every two weeks,” Mays said.
The audience for a podcast such as this is very specific,
“I’d say the target audience is weirdos like me. My wife was very interested to see if there was anybody else or if I would be listening to my own podcast. What I usually find is that every town in Nebraska there’s one guy who keeps track of this stuff and cares about it as much as me. I’ve tried to reach out to those guys and I’ve marketed it on Facebook,” Mays said.
Although some people are introduced to the podcast through Facebook, most of the audience comes from Twitter,
“I’ve probably drummed up the most viewers on Twitter. Once a couple of guys who are interested find it, they’ll retweet it and spread it that way,” Mays said.
Mays has met many people with similar interests through his podcast,
“I met a guy who has done a history of Central City athletics, I’ve met a guy who specializes in a little sports conference down south of Lincoln of tiny schools,” Mays said.
Suiting Up Varsity has attracted a niche audience of avid sports enthusiast,
“Right now, each episode is getting downloaded about 20 times after a couple of weeks. Evidently there’s a couple people out there who are at least remotely interested,” Mays said.
Mays’ family has been nothing but supportive of his endeavor in podcast recording,
“My family thinks I’m a goofball, but they’re supportive of things like that. I’ve tried not to waste family time by working on the podcast. In fact I tried to hide it for as long as I could by working on it when everyone else was asleep. They support it though, they know I need an outlet to keep me fired up about things, ” Mays said.
Mays thinks the podcast has been an interesting experiment and hopes that it makes him a better teacher,
“It makes me feel like a real writer again. It helps me remember what the process is when you don’t know the right answer. When I write an Animal Farm essay I know what those are supposed to look like because I’ve it a million times. When I’m writing something where I don’t know what the end project is, I go through some of the same things students go through,” Mays said.
If you’re interested in checking out Suiting Up Varsity: Nebraska High School Sports History, you can find it on iTunes or can click the link here.
