SNOW - AGAIN! What happens on a snowy morning at NPTV?

A good friend of NPTV, took notice to our dwindling blog posts, so this ones for you Brett!

Of course everyone knows that the fastest way to find out about school delays and closings is NPTV.  How do I know this, because we post on NPTV first!  Actually, many people wonder about the process we go through on a snowy morning.  ((quick promotion)) ---Find out more by watching this month's edition of North Penn's Finest. 

Typically, Dave Kelly - Coordinator of Custodial Maintenance and John Strobel - Manager of Support Services- from our Facilities department track the weather overnight and drive the roads as early as 3 or 4 in the morning to assess the conditions.

Dave and John make a recommendation to our Superintendent, Dr. Curt Dietrich then joins a conference call with Superintendents of the sending schools to North Montco Tecnical Career Center to discuss what each district is planning.  A closure of one sending school has a a big impact on the classes for NMTCC.  Dr. Dietrich makes the call based upon the recommendations of our facilities and transportation department.  The very next phone call is to NPTV.  And literally within seconds of John Strobel saying - "Schools are closed"  The information is immediately on NPTV.  IN the spirit of the Winter Olympic games, we pride on ourselves on seeing how fast the notification goes up on the channel. This past storm on 2/26/10, we posted the information as John finished his sentence. .003 seconds! 

Of course we use all means of communications to notify our community of delays, closures or dismissals.  After NPTV, you can find the info at www.npenn.org, Inform-a-Phone (215) 368-7662) as well as all of the local broadcast outlets.  I mean all.  If you would like text notifications, there are two options we utilize.  You can sign-up for alerts at Montgomery County Alert System.  Make sure you select North Penn School District as a notification.  You can also follow us on Twitter/ NPSD.

In cases of unscheduled early dismissals, we will also utilize our School Messenger system to notify parents when we will be dismissing.  In that case we will call all the phone numbers and e-mail addresses that parents have provided on their emergency notification cards.  We do not use School Messenger for standard 2 hour delays or closures due to weather.  For more info on our emergency communication visit the NPSD website.

If you are interested in more blizzard coverage take a look at our facilities department in action here for the video and here for the photos.  Please feel free to comment.  We look forward to hearing from you.  Stay Warm!

We keep cranking out the shows!

January is always the busiest month of the year for our NPTV crew.  Everyone has been working tirelessly day and night to not only bring you all of the events going on this month, but also to keep the feature programming and packages coming.  If you haven't had a chance yet, check out our weekly "Mornings" program featuring North Penn High School students with a dash trivia, fun and a taste of silliness.  Our career study students Rita Kraynak, Jason Barnada, Amber Maiden and Shane Dwyer produced this show in it's entirely.  Take note of our new intro created by Senior Jason Barnada and features the music of "Find Vienna"

The Winter Sports Season has begun

It's been a few weeks since our last post. We finally found a company with a medical electronics grade generator and we made the trip to Coatesville for the last game of the year for North Penn. While it was disappointing loss for NP, we had a great time producing the close game for our viewers. The Coatesville High School folks were great to work with and we look forward to another post season with the football team next year. Quick funny side note on that trip: The Mini Van we booked to transport our Career Study students early to the game had a broken driver side window. We didn't know it until we left and put the window down never to have it go up again. For the entire 50 minute drive home in 22 degree weather, we bundled up with our hats scarfs and gloves while the cool air rushed through the van. A memorable night indeed... We started our winter sports season with A Double Dual swim meet on Friday, December 11th. Girl’s basketball kicks off tonight. We won't be live due to the board meeting, but will be on as soon as the game ends. If we forget to blog before the break, we wish everyone a safe, relaxing and joyous winter break. See you in 2010!

No Power, No Game

Hi Folks,

We tried again to find an appropriate generator for our TV truck, but again we had no luck.  We encourage you to listen to tonight's game on WNPV 1440 am or on their website at http://www.wnpv1440.com/

We are already looking for a generator in the case that we move again next week. Stay tuned!!!

The TV gods are crazy

Late Thursday afternoon, we found out the North Penn Football Playoff game vs. Council Rock North was moved to the new Souderton High School Stadium.  We surveyed the stadium early on Friday morning to find out if our truck could be placed close enough to the stadium, if our cables would reach, if there was enough room in the press box and if we could find power.  On the way over I was thinking that it was going to be improbable that all of these stars would align.  Sure enough, when we got the the Souderton staff was more than helpful in our survey.  It looked like our truck would fit through the gate, the cables would reach and there was more than ample room in the press box.  We did need to rent a generator.  We found one from a local rental company for a great price.  We gathered the troops and made the trip.  Even though the winds were howling, and the rain was misting we started our set-up.  Our generator arrived.  We fired it up.  Turned on the power.. then trip.  Reset the breaker.... trip.   move from 30 amp cicuit to 20 amp circuit. No Trip.  Turn on our equipment... trip. 

That's the tough thing about TV, no power, no TV.    We weren't happy about it, and we were looking forward to broadcasting from this beautiful new stadium, but sometimes decisions are made for you.  North Penn's own Kyle Berger is there at least broadcasting live for WNPV.

You can listen live at 1440 am or online http://www.wnpv1440.com/

What a crazy day for NPTV

It was quite the adventure on Friday with NPTV.  This afternoon, NPHS held all all school Pep Rally.  The first one we have had outside since 1988.  It was a great time and the student body really showed their school spirit. 

Clearly, one of the highlights was the Dizzy Competition. Here we see secretary Sue Busch doing a face plant after spinning 7 times.










Don't worry.  Mrs. Busch was fine!

Principal of NPHS, Mr Hynes did his fair share of spinning as well.

      NPTV is always there to help!



Right from the Pep Rally, we began setting up as the skies began to darken.  The wind began to gust and knocked over one of our cameras taking it out of service for the night.  We set everything we could without setting up the remainder of our cameras and took a quick dinner break.  As we began our final connections, the rain began to fall.  Our team did a great job braving the elements to bring NPHS homecoming 2009 to our viewers.  As this year's Homecoming King - Sky Lynch and Queen  - Julie Williams were announced, the rain began to just pound us.

We waited through the remainder of halftime to see if the weather would relent. It did not, and we made the decision to protect our equipment and call it a night. We quickly broke down. North Penn continued to dominate Souderton and won the game 27-6. What an end to a crazy week.

Back to the Blog!

It's been a a few days since we last brought you up-to-date with our productions.  We have been hitting the turf field hard this month.  Field Hockey and Soccer have been the featured event for the past two weeks.  Check out Senior recognition night for both sports this week.  We have also been very busy with internal NPTV productions for staff and students.  We will be taping our first edition of Inside North Montco featuring the programs and students of the Technical Career Center on Wednesday afternoon.  We will be broadcasting the presentation of the NPHS homecoming court on Wednesday morning beginning at 7:25 a.m., NP Boys Soccer ob Wednesday night, School Board meeting on Thursday night, coverage of our first pep rally in years and Homecoming on Friday night from Crawford Stadium.  We have the opportunity to demo a special replay unit for this Friday's football game.  Check out our special angles and replays.  We will round out our week with a special event on Saturday.  More to come on that one..... Busy, busy, busy.  As always, let us know how we are doing.  You can post a comment to this blog or e-mail us nptv@npenn.org.

See you on the air!