WILL Press Room
Introducing Illinois Public Media
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
WILL AM-FM-TV is taking a new name—Illinois Public Media. The individual stations, WILL-AM, WILL-FM, and WILL-TV retain their names and identities.
The overall organization adopts the new name to reflect WILL’s expansion into the Internet and outreach projects in the community, said WILL general manager Mark Leonard. “The media landscape is changing, and the ways that people use media are changing as well,” Leonard said. “Our name change signals to people that we’ll continue to be relevant and that we’ll continue to be a public media organization.”
Leonard said WILL also wanted to use the name to strengthen its ties to the University of Illinois. “We’re licensed to the university and every day we draw on the rich knowledge of the people who work at the U of I,” he said. “We maintain our editorial independence, but putting the Illinois in our name emphasizes our relationship with the university.”
The name change doesn’t mean a change in WILL’s quality programming or mission, he said. “We’re still WILL, but we’re now reaching many people with our programming, such as our agriculture service, on the Internet. They may have never heard of WILL, but they do know about Illinois. Illinois has a global reputation and WILL, now Illinois Public Media, is part of that,” Leonard said.
The name change also reflects the expansion of WILL-TV’s programming elsewhere in the state and country. WILL-TV’s Illinois Gardener is now being distributed to other public television stations in the state, and its recent documentary, Lincoln: Prelude to the Presidency, aired on more than 100 stations around the country. The Illinois Public Media designation will be advantageous for pursuing such distribution opportunities.
Community engagement, including its Youth Media Workshop and Young Learners Initiative, is becoming an increasingly important part of WILL’s mission, and the new name better encompasses this work as well as the Illinois Radio Reader, a WILL service that provides news and information to blind and print-handicapped audiences in east central Illinois, Leonard said.
Along with the new name, users of WILL’s services will see a new look for WILL’s logos. A new Illinois Public Media “mark” features an “i” popping out of a rounded box. “We wanted to show that we’re accessible and sometimes surprising,” said WILL marketing director Kate Dobrovolny. The WILL-AM, WILL-FM and WILL-TV logos have also undergone a facelift. “We’ve had the same logos for more than 17 years, so this is an opportunity to refresh our look,” she said. To save money, the changes will be incorporated only as new pieces are printed. “It will be a gradual process,” Dobrovolny said.