Josh Queener has tried everything.

He’s begged, filed requests and even bargained. But nothing the 2001 UT graduate has done has brought in more funding for his baby – The Volunteer Channel.

Queener took over as the director of TVC in the Spring Semester of 1999. Filing away countless hours in the university’s Video and Photography Center, he saw UT’s first and only television station develop from a small and inexperienced group of 10 members in 1998 to about 80 active students this semester.

Early on, Queener saw no fiscal reward for efforts – that was until after graduation.

“They were looking for people to take over positions,” Queener said. “I wanted to do production direction.

“By the end of the month they put me in charge of TVC and just threw everything in my lap.”

In the spring of 2002, Queener took over as production coordinator for the Video and Photography Center. But receiving a paycheck didn’t diminish his efforts to turn TVC into a thriving campus station.

“I wanted to see it used to its potential,” he said. “Having something like TVC gives a lot of real world experience to students.

“It worked for me at least.”

Queener didn’t waste much time. Since taking over, he has molded a student group with four to five hours of programming a week into two campus channels with multiple student produced shows.

But he did have some help.

“The Video and Photo Center does so much for us,” Queener said. “In the beginning we shared and borrowed equipment. Most of it was just old stuff, but it was enough to help.

“It is their equipment, so anytime they needed to use it, we had to give it up.”

But equipment, while spurring growth for TVC in the beginning, now has hit a hitch in its development. After receiving 126 applications for membership this semester, Queener has finally reached his glass ceiling.

Lack of funding and field equipment has forced the channel, run entirely on volunteer hours, to withdraw from several potential projects.

The students have apparently noticed.

“Last week, I brought up the idea of needing more funding, and some of the students got the idea to write the letters,” Queener said. “It was largely a student effort. They were disgusted at such a resource being wasted like this.

“It’s under-funded and over-utilized.”

So far Queener has received more than 30 letters, mostly from juniors and seniors he said “had benefited from the program.”

One of those students was TVC president Andy Chapman.

“We need funding so we can get equipment and go out and do our own stuff,” Chapman said. “We have so many possibilities. We look at what other campuses are doing and just get frustrated.”

Like Queener, volunteering time for TVC hasn’t been a problem for Chapman, a recent transfer student from Columbia.

“It’s a lot of strain and pressure, but as I see it, it’s going to pay off,” he said. “I’m down here every day. I get the experience of being around a studio.

“You can’t beat that.”

But that experience is being missed by several other students, according to Queener.

“We get all kinds of show ideas and students asking to help out,” he said. “There’s enough students to run a 24-7 news channel, but there’s not camcorders for us to take out.”

Campus administrators haven’t been deaf to Queener’s requests.

Ron Laffitte, director of Student Activities, sits on the Recreation, Entertainment and Social Board, which hears campus groups’ requests for funding.

The RES Board is a mixture of 24 students, alumni and faculty that give out a portion of the university’s Student Activities Fee to develop campus programming.

Laffitte said the committee’s job isn’t easy.

“With most groups, the requested amount is more than we have to allocate,” he said. “Funding always forces hard decisions.

“Josh has been trying for a long time now.”

Queener has been successful in receiving $500 from the board every year since 2000, but that total coupled with TVC’s annual member dues have still not been enough.

“The RES board has helped, but it doesn’t last long enough,” Queener said. “We’ve had to try all kinds of things.”

One of those things is mutually beneficial venues. TVC is currently teaming up with RecSports to promote their facilities in return for the campus channel’s own promotion.

“We’re just going to take advantage of everyone working out in the T-RECS,” Queener said. “There could be a hundred people at a time staring at a television with TVC on it. That gives students a way to see what we offer.”

With some time, and a little funding, Queener hopes that TVC can offer much more.