Today we’d like to introduce you to Serah Mead. Them and their team share their story with us below:
Serah grew up in a small coastal town in California. She attended schools in the bay area and obtained her BFA in Graphic Design from California College of the Arts in San Francisco. After graduating in 2010, she moved to Moab and started a life with her partner Gabriel.
In Winter 2011, they took a brief break from the desert to practice orchard management and organic seed farming/production in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. There, in Brownsville, Serah and Gabriel established an artist residency called ArtFarm which hosted five artists, two music festivals, and three art shows. In 2014, they moved back to Moab, happy to return to the red rocks and amazing community.
Serah has been dedicated to community service work and nonprofit activity since she was in high school. Over the years, Serah has contributed to more than 10 NGOs and NPOs, occupying positions such as office assistant, interim treasurer, volunteer coordinator, Americorps VISTA, Associate Director, and peer sex educator, to name a few.
Serah is a certified Change Leader through the Change Leader Institute provided Utah Division of Arts and Museums and completed the 2020 Emerging Leaders Institute through the Foundation of the Alliance for Community Media. Serah Currently sits on the board, and committees, for the National Federation of Community Broadcasters and the Rocky Mountain Community Radio Coalition.
Serah has always had a love of radio. From recording her favorite tunes on a hand-held FM radio/tape player to interning at KCSM, the Jazz radio station housed in the basement of the College of San Mateo, Serah has been drawn to the power of broadcasting as an agent for creative expression and community cohesion and has remained a fierce advocate for wild creative expression, believing in the power of the arts to make positive change in communities, especially through the truly egalitarian medium of noncommercial public broadcasting.
Her journey at KZMU Moab Community Radio began as a volunteer DJ in 2014, became the station’s Music Director in 2015, and was hired as the General Manager/Executive Director in 2018.
During that time, Serah has led or facilitated the hands-on youth programs, annual live radio plays, a regional radio conference, staff, and budget growth, strategic planning, a rebrand, and more. She is currently working on a capital campaign to expand the station’s service to the Moab community and increase capacity for the rapid growth the station is experiencing.
In addition to running this wild and wooly public radio station, Serah is a hypnotherapist-in-training through the Divine Feminine School of Hypnosis, loves being outside, deeply listening to music, and spending time with her partner Gabriel, their daughter Verdell, and dog Uma.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
While the road here has not been totally smooth the entire time, I’ve had the privilege of working with incredibly supportive and talented women who have given me the courage and confidence to be where I am today.
Some struggles have included earning trust from a dedicated and long-time crew of board members, DJs, and community members who love this radio station. Earning trust is playing a long game, with slow incremental change and it has paid off tremendously as I now have a wonderful team that demonstrates reciprocal trust and admiration. I feel very lucky to have a staff and board like the one we have now!
Learning how to balance my identities as an organizational leader, a partner, and a mother has also been challenging. There are times when I feel I’m not able to do my best at anything I engage in, a sensation most, if not all, working mothers can identify with.
It’s very real and very hard. Having a community of other women in public radio has been critical for my sense of purpose and self-trust! Over time, it has become easier to find that balance, trust that my best is actually great and that all challenges come in waves, nothing is permanent.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I have extensive training and experience in the field of Graphic Design, which is still very much a passion of mine. However, in the last few years, I’ve become more and more invested in the broadcast medium as a tool for story-telling, sharing passions, and building community.
I’m most proud of the two short-form radio shows I host. One is called Take it or Leave it with Beaver and Cleaver. It’s a weekly 30-minute call-in show based on the premise of me, and my co-host, offering advice to callers. However, nine shows out of 10, we get no calls and we end up improvising conversations about our own experiences, which then prompt listeners to respond. Accidentally it has become a show that many people tune into for comic relief, a sense of connection, and, sometimes, actual advice.
The other show is called Liner Notes, a 30-minute weekly show where I and my cohost dive deep into new music releases, genres, artists, and their crossovers. Think of a time when you may have poured over the details of a favorite artist, song, or album, perhaps it was in a Spotify bio, Wikipedia article, or maybe even actual liner notes from an LP.
This show is so aligned with my natural instinct to obsess over my favorite bands, their collaborators, etc. It’s a joy to share music with my cohost and to bring it to a greater audience. The music we share often relates to current events, another way to deepen the impact of music as a healing and critical form of creative expression.
For example, in January 2021, we played all punk bands from the DC area, and more recently in early March 2022, we curated a show featuring all Ukrainian artists.
How do you define success?
As my child grows and my radio station reaches and exceeds its limits of capacity, my understanding of success changes on a regular basis.
Sometimes it’s as simple as checking things off a list and getting to bed at a decent time. On other days success feels like a nebulous combination of achieving equitable conditions for my amazing staff, being recognized by federal grantors as a worthy investment, and all the while having super-fly style. Just kidding on the last part!
Ultimately, I think success is a feeling you get when you realize your basic needs are met and there is room to rest, create, and engage with one’s community.
Contact Info:
- Email: serah@kzmu.org
- Website: https://www.kzmu.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kzmu.moab/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KZMUMoab
- SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-452372146-352514478
Image Credits:
Serah Mead, Kik Grant, Molly Marcello, Brandy Bowmaster, Nara Bopp-Williams, and Marty Durlin
