About Us:

Sue Schardt | Joan Roman | Angelynn Grant

SchardtMEDIA was founded in 1998 to create and support solution-oriented programming for radio and new media. President Sue Schardt works with a network of associates throughout the radio industry, and is called on by clients to act as an agent in a range of capacities, including: establishing marketing/services infrastructures, producing programs for national distribution, initiating and facilitating program advisory groups, creating program marketing plans, mentoring, formulating and expediting communications strategies, working with other producers to take a concept from the stage of "idea" through program development to launch, grant writing, and conducting program and marketing seminars.

Sue Schardt is a respected radio veteran and award winning producer with extensive experience in public, commercial, community and international broadcasting. Since founding SchardtMEDIA in 1998, she has worked with the networks and with dozens of stations and independent producers throughout the US public radio system and overseas to produce programming, build infrastructure, and devise and implement strategy. Her extensive work with international broadcasters -- Radio Netherlands, World Radio Network and its affiliated network of two dozen overseas broadcasters -- is aimed at broadening Americans' understanding of the world beyond their borders.

With funding from CPB and consortia of public radio investors, Schardt recently completed a two year benchmark study of public radio's freelance sector. Mapping Public Radio's Independent Landscape analyzed nearly 2700 hours of programming content and data from two in-depth surveys of program acquirers and producers from virtually every walk of the industry. The final report and recommendations are to be released in January 2006.

Previous SchardtMEDIA projects include, in 1998, the launch and development of NPR's first overnight information service, World Radio Network from NPR. Schardt was hired by Public Radio International develop and implement an investor relations strategy as part of the successful launch of Public Interactive, one of the first public media initiatives to develop web-based listener and station services. In 2002-2003, Schardt, working with NPR and World Radio Network, initiated a pilot project to develop a new concept in daily international information programming. Atlas, Radio Stories from Around the World drew on the network of reporters and stringers from a dozen of the world's leading broadcasting organization to take a step back from the day-to-day news grind and tell stories of universal human experience, regardless of geography.

Schardt has been involved in a variety of collaborative programming and strategic projects with public radio's leading stations and networks -- NPR, PRI, Minnesota Public Radio, KCRW/Los Angeles, WGBH/Boston, WBEZ/Chicago Public Radio, and Wisconsin Public Radio. In July 2005, Schardt and WNYC Radio joined forces to produce a one-hour music special, "Heart of Song: Renee Fleming and Fred Hersch" that was broadcast by 100 stations throughout the US and distributed overseas by NPR Worldwide. Her nationally syndicated clients include Living on Earth, The Connection, Latino USA, and Radio Netherlands' EuroQuest. SchardtMEDIA devised and implemented the launch strategy for From the Top, one of the most successful and fastest-growing nationally syndicated music programs in the country.

Schardt has presented or produced events at a number of system-wide conferences, including those convened by NFCB, AIR, PRNDI, PRC, and PRPD. Her longstanding free-form music program, In the Margin of the Other, airs on MIT's radio station, WMBR in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Joan Roman has been with SchardtMEDIA since October 2001 leading station development with an emphasis on strategic research and analysis on behalf of SchardtMEDIA clients.

Joan Roman photo Roman has more than a decade of experience in a range of traditional and new media projects. Prior to her work with SchardtMEDIA, she served as the Director of Business Development & Strategic Projects at Public Interactive (PI), public radio's top on-line provider of station web content and services, where she managed strategic partner-associated technology and business evaluations and alliances. At PI she overhauled streaming operations to position PI among Arbitron's top 10 streaming networks. Roman is a pioneer in Interactive TV, leading the development, implementation and operations for NewsGuide, a real-time nationwide news service of VideoGuide Inc., a subsidiary of Gemstar Inc. (GMST). As Director of Content, she helped position the service as one of VideoGuide's leading subscription-revenue generators. She was Director of Content & Product Development at Gotuit Media Inc. (now Gotuit Media Corp.) a developer of time-shifted services for video on demand (VOD).

The roots of Roman's passion for radio date back to the late '80's when she was lured away from her busy florist shop by the siren sound of Hanna Barbera sound effects and the magic one could create with razor blades and 1/4" tape. Her first radio gig was in the production department at WBCN, one of Boston's leading commercial stations. She moved into the national program syndication world as part of the production and engineering team for Monitor Radio. Her radio work continues at WMBR, MIT's free-form radio station, where she serves as Production Director teaching non-linear digital editing and produces her weekly program, Three Ring Circus, now entering its 15th year. The days of razor blades and tape are gone, but the occasional bone-crunch and swoosh can be heard when Roman is behind the board... or the computer.

Angelynn Grant photo A graphic designer working in both print and web, Angelynn Grant has worked for SchardtMEDIA as web developer and principal designer for client advertising, logos, and program support materials. Grant is also an occasional research associate.

She graduated with honors from Harvard College in 1977, going on to graduate programs in mathematics at Brown and RPI, earning an MA and an MS, respectively. After that, she followed her new love of art and the printed word to Yale, where she received an MFA in graphic design in 1984. For the next dozen years, she taught design as an Associate Professor at Simmons College, as adjunct faculty at the Rhode Island School of Design and the Art Institute of Boston, and as an artist-in-residence at MIT. As a freelance designer in Cambridge, she now spends equal time designing websites and other digital content and designing for print, while also writing about design and related topics. Her print design appears on a range of items from music CDs for Rounder Records to publications for Wellesley College. She is a regular contributor to Communication Arts magazine, where she writes on subjects ranging from design and architecture to state-of-the-art design applications. She's also a leading authority on the history of album cover design, contributing to the 2004 book The Mischievous Art of Jim Flora, writing "Album Cover Design: Past Influences, Present Struggles & Future Predictions" for the Jan/Feb 2001 issue of Communication Arts, and a chapter entitled "The Golden Age of Jazz Covers" in the companion catalogue for the 1999 exhibit Jazz Gráfico at Spain's Institut Valencia d'Art Modern. For the past fifteen years, as a sideline, she's been the producer, engineer and host of Coffeetime, a jazz radio program first heard at Harvard's station WHRB in the summer of '91 and heard since then on MIT's station WMBR. More at www.angelynngrant.com.

The Mission

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