Editor’s Note: Student Union is written by students at Brewer High School, Hermon High School, John Bapst Memorial High School in Bangor, Schenck High School in East Millinocket, Searsport District High School and Stearns High School in Millinocket. The weekly column is a joint effort among the schools, the Bangor Daily News and Acadia Hospital. This week’s column was written by a Stearns High School student. The Stearns adviser is Sue Buzzell.

Students at Stearns High School in Millinocket are speaking out to the community in a way new to the Katahdin region.

Although the phrase “Katch the KAT” is now a popular expression throughout the neighboring towns of East Millinocket and Millinocket, just several months ago the notion of a local television station seemed like a far cry.

The idea of a public access channel floated around the community for several years, but it wasn’t until September 2004 that any action was taken.

The concept was brought before Millinocket Town Manager Gene Conologue by several members of the community. Among them was Stearns High School art teacher John Noerr, who believed that a public access channel would “fill a gap present in the community.”

Once the public access channel was approved, Beeline Cable donated the connection of Channel 13 to the project, as well as equipment to get started. The station was set up in the town’s Business Resource and Innovation Center, while news of the event spread throughout Stearns by word-of-mouth.

Soon students joined the project, dubbing it Katahdin Area Television, KAT for short.

In the brief time KAT has been running, much has been accomplished. The station went on air in December, displaying scrolling information with student-produced music in the background. After midnight on the first of January, KAT aired its first visual broadcast, a Millinocket Town Council meeting.

Since then, the channel has featured school sporting events such as hockey games, self-interest commercials, students’ music and additional town meetings.

KAT is working on a community calendar and several public service announcements to be aired. A weekly report featuring topics presented in area newspapers, The Community Press and The Katahdin Times, is a project high on the station’s list of prospective broadcasts.

There has also been discussion of a historical DVD slideshow of Millinocket, 1989 to 2005, which would be produced using archives from the Millinocket Historical Society.

While distinctive in that it is the only production facility in the region, KAT is truly set apart because it is a station run not by professionals, but by volunteers, many of them students.

Noerr does not see lack of experience as a disadvantage for KAT.

“Our inexperience does not decrease our drive, and with dedication our limitations will become our strengths,” he said.

KAT offers hands-on learning and experience for students, as well as other members of the community. It also provides an outlet for students where they are not judged by the academic standards common to school-sponsored activities.

The station’s general manager, Clayton Manzo, is a junior at Stearns. Manzo dedicates much of his after-school time to the project and believes “it is a great experience full of opportunity.”

KAT’s founders hope that it may gain profit and become a true business. By accomplishing this, KAT would have the means to offer scholarships and business opportunities to students majoring in production, broadcasting, sales and marketing and business. A larger studio and more volunteers would offer on-site training for students, perhaps even through a school-run program.

KAT, its supporters hope, one day may be large enough to branch out into other communities, but to do so would require more content, and more volunteers. “More regular volunteers are needed. We have plenty of suggestions from the community, but what we really need is more people to help carry them out,” Noerr says.

At 5 p.m. Mondays, KAT’s staff meets on the top floor of the Business Resource and Innovation Center in Millinocket, and anyone interested is encouraged to join. A Web site, www.katchthekat.com, has been established as a way to contact the station with ideas, concerns and offerings of a helping hand.