Design our 2026 station sticker!

Calling all artists, cartoonists, and doodlers!!!

We’re looking for design pitches for our annual station sticker.

We stick these stickers all over the place — well, our listeners do. We send them as thank yous to fundrive donors, give them out at community events, and use them to patch up audio cables (kidding! or are we?).

We will provide a modest stipend for the winning sticker design of $100. The design will become fair use for the station for any purpose, but the artist can retain use as well (portfolios, etc.). This work will be seen far and wide, and will credit the artist in all the places we use the art!

To submit a sticker pitch please use the following guidelines:

1. Concept: We’re looking for designs that capture the power of community radio and the uniqueness of WGDR and WGDH. This year we are buying a brand new antenna and raising it on a new tower for WGDR. So, incorporating a stronger signal vibe would be cool!

2. Local art rocks: We are looking to uplift visual Vermont artists with this project, so please no submissions from out of state. Cartoonists, block printers, drawers, doodlers, go for it!

3. Specs: we need a print-ready, digital design. This can be either hand-drawn and well-scanned to a digital copy or a digitally designed graphic. It can be black and white or color. The image should be within a 4” by 4” design area (nothing much smaller than that). It can be a die-cut design (cut out like our 50th edition cows were (see below) or a traditional square or rectangle design. These are meant to be true, fun sticker art and do not need to have our logo incorporated. The sticker does need to include the following text: Central Vermont Community Radio, WGDR at 91.1 FM, WGDH at 91.7 FM, and WGDR.org. Besides that, have fun with it!

4. How to submit: Send your design idea, along with a very brief blurb about you, your work, and any helpful links to Llu@WGDR.org by Friday, February 20. We’ll ask programmers and listeners to vote on the winning designs, via our website, and announce the winning pitches as we go into the spring fundrive starting March 6!

Feel free to reach out to Llu with any questions too and spread the word to your arty friends! Thanks to our two past sticker designers, Diana Clarke & Rachel Lindsay (see their designs below).

New voices coming on the air.

To kick off the new year, we’re thrilled to welcome seven new voices to the station, launching six brand-new local shows starting in February. The lineup includes five talk-based shows, one music show, and one talk/music hybrid, covering a wide range of perspectives and creative concepts. From spotlighting nonbinary and queer music artists, to call-in conversations on community issues and politics, to news and interviews on politics and economics through a working-class and social justice lens, these shows bring fresh energy and insight to our airwaves. You’ll also hear explorations of underrepresented healthcare topics from medical professionals and a parody-driven take on classic radio tropes.

The new programmers are Aidan Gongloff-Piche, Ari Erlbaum, Fern Sutton-Smith, Nicole Valcour, Traven Leyshon (co-hosting a new show with Joseph Gainza), Walt Amses (co-hosting a new show with Steve Farnham), and Fia Prestigiacomo. We’ll update folks on show start dates and the updated schedule soon. Be sure to tune in and help us welcome these new folks when their shows debut!​

They are completing training - you'll hear them practicing - and then will have shows start in February. This takes our schedule to more than 75% local and live programming. A huge milestone for the station, especially as we prepare to expand our broadcast reach this spring for WGDR and 91.1 FM. 

WGDR Antenna FCC Application Submitted!

We are very grateful to our FCC attorney, engineer, and technical consultant who teamed up with me over the holidays to get our WGDR antenna officially submitted. This is a huge milestone in our progress toward expanding and improving the WGDR, 91.1 FM signal. We should hear back from the FCC in a couple of months and of course, we'll keep you posted.

In the meantime, we want to extend a huge thank you to the many folks who have given to the WGDR Tower Fund so far. We are 60% of our way to the $175K goal and are on pace to have what we need to start preparing for the project this spring. This, combined with listener support to meet our our end of year fundraising goals, have us so excited for this new year. Your support is a literal investment in the future of WGDR — helping us expand our signal, strengthen our reach, and bring you even more of the music, voices, and stories that matter.

Learn more about the project and the timeline here.

A bigger, better WGDR signal is coming in 2026 — and it’s all because of you. Thank you!

Come Play Bingo on 1/29 at Charlie-Os!

Central Vermont Community Radio is heading out of the studio and into the community in 2026!

And first up… B-I-N-G-O! But not just any bingo — MUSIC BINGO!

Join us at the World Famous Charlie-Os in downtown Montpelier for a night of beats, laughs, and bingo fun on Thursday, January 29th from 8 to 10pm.

We’ll have 6 rounds of regular bingo, with a championship round of music (like name that tune). A suggested donation of $10 to the station lets you play all rounds! There are fabulous prizes up for grabs for each round too!

The night is hosted by Vermont’s own drag queen legend Emoji Nightmare, with sweet sounds from WGDR’s DJ Emma of The Revel Level.

We’ll see you there! 🎉

CVCR 2025 Station Award Winners!

Each year, the station recognizes three folks who go above and beyond for the station. Voted on by their peers, the Station Awards are a nice way to lift up our dedicated volunteers. Congrats to all!

Best in Show: Still Life with Club Soda

Nominees (shows who got votes): Strange & Deinger, The Good Ways Reggae, Still Life Club Soda, In Common Sounds, Hyper Local Dispatch, Xav Wax, Long & Winding Road, Spiral Galaxy, Kitchen Permaculture, Acoustic Harmony, Jagler Katz Worm Hole

A note to Club Soda from your peers:“Still Life with Club Soda has great variety, candidness, goofiness, great guests, brilliant emails. Serena stays so crushable. It’s the show that I laugh the hardest at. Feels like I'm hanging out with friends. The creative segments that keep listening fresh and engaging. Serena is the most natural radio host, and she brings wonderful people and ideas and occasional surprises to her show.”

Nifties Newbie: Kind & the Good Ways Reggae Show

Nominees (new shows that got a vote): Civic Standard, Kind & The Good Ways Reggae Show, Syd & Natasha & the Hyper Local Dispatch, Walkin’ Will & the Show of Life, Kelly & Eggs on Toast, Bill & Listen Up, Dan & Rubber Room, and J and Unshelled, and Khonsu X & Titan - Broken Bois Collective

A note for Kind from your peers: “Love some good reggae! Always worth a listen, comes on at a perfect time to accompany me when cooking. Good music choices that and important blurbs about the artist/history of the music.

Dave Tucker Volunteer of the Year Award: Charles Rossell
Nominees: Mark Michaelis, Charles Rossell, Bill Hahn, David Mannix, DJ Jeffery, and Carl.

A note to Charles from your peers/Llu: As the wrangler of all our volunteers and seeing who steps up, how they do, and what they do, I am in full agreement with the voters in voting Charles as volunteer of the year. He has been on the board for nearly three years, is the current chair, programming rep from the board, eager to help in big and small ways - making food for our parties, stuffing mailings, and everything in between. I can’t think of anyone better to be presented with the newly renamed Dave Tucker Volunteer of the Year Award than Charles, Thank you!

Each award winner gets a cute little microphone award coming in January!

⏪ A rewind of 2025 at Central Vermont Community Radio.

What a year it was, for all of us. We're so glad to be in community with you - near and far - through the power of community radio. As we wrap this year, here is our CVCR 2025 Impact Report (and below).

Listen Local: ​We are committed to continuing to expand and improve the local programming that makes the station stand out.

"Just wanted to let you know that [student's] radio project work was a hit—thank YOU so much for giving her such a cool experience to supplement her learning! Grateful again for such a cool experience for all three of the kids—so awesome!" - Mom of a homeschool student who got to explore the station and be on the air

This year we had:

•  135 shows are in our schedule, 74 are were locally made by locals this year and nearly all of those are live (69% of the main schedule is local!)

• 17 were new local shows this year

• 8 shows step back from the airwaves (retired, moved of state, etc.)

• a new, hyper local daily weather forecast added by our pay Roger Hill

• special programming like a live feed from the New Orleans Jazz Fest thanks to WWOZ, a great 6 month radio show partnership with the Civic Standard, barters with the Times Argus and Hardwick Gazette to lift up each of our media outlets with each other

• countless hours of your neighbors covering what is happening nationally and the impact here in Vermonter, as well as giving you a break from it all with great music shows.

"Thanks for replying. I ended up figuring it out the song. Yay for WGDR! Love you guys!" - A listener discovering music from one of our shows.

With about a dozen folks starting new programmer training this month, we are on pace to have another record number of Vermonters on the air with us by 2026. Stay tuned in for creative, informative, and entertaining content every single day.

Honoring Those Who've Left An Impact: ​So many individuals come together to make this station possible. In the last year, we lost one of our most dedicated programmers, volunteers, and board members - Dave Tucker. His passing was deeply felt by all of us and we miss him dearly.

We also saw the retirement of the shows from long time programmers - Jeff Lindholm (Geezer Rock), Peter Goreau (Spanning the Chasm), who both had decades on the air with us. There were many more folks who left their mark on the station - through shows or volunteering - thank you all!

Turning Challenges into Celebrations: ​We faced no lease, funding gaps, capacity crunches, attacks on public media, and more this year. As we always do, we rose to the moment and:

• inked an affordable new two-year lease with Ledgeworks (the new owners of former Goddard campus);

• secured $150K in state funding for all community radio stations on Vermont to upgrade aging gear for future emergency response;

• transitioned from our founding board to a brand new board focused on strategy and capacity to ready us up for big moves in 2026;

• lined up a new tower location in Plainfield for the brand new WGDR antenna and secured over 50% of the costs it will take to move us there next spring, increasing our broadcast by 8 times the coverage!