WAVM Faculty Advisor, Joseph P. Magno

Mags speaks at the 1997 WAVM Banquet.
Background (left to right) Sam Huntington, Chris Johnson, Nick Huston, Matt Pomfret, and Laura Pratt

"MAGS"Joe Magno. Only outsiders, who are surely trying to be polite, call him that. To everyone in WAVM, he is simply "Mags," And over the years WAVM has grown and been steadied by his tutelage. However, to mention as much in his company would raise a scoff. Mags deflects any praise, saying the students did all of the work.
Mags isn't always easy to understand...

Completely understanding Mags takes years and patience, but a good way to start is in his name. To use the familiar appellation "Mags" means you can approach him, even with the zany idea of starting a high school radio station. As Mags, his answer isn't that of a teacher or a faculty advisor or some other authority figure. He is no longer just one of those figures;
As Mags, he's also your friend...

Mags and Sam Huntington

Mags graduated from Boston College in 1962 and, shortly thereafter, began his career at the Maynard Public Schools as a Fowler Middle School English Teacher. By a decade later, he had transferred to Maynard High School and was the Town's Director of Media Services overseeing the public school libraries, federal funding, community relations, adult education and a popular Audio/Visual club, which, in a way, was the forerunner to WAVM.

During the Summer of 1997, The Community Chambers of Commerce voted Mags to receive the Ken Olsen Maynard Leadership Award, presented annually to an individual who has been a positive influence to the Town of Maynard.

Mags has been one of the integral players in the history of WAVM, mainly because he was there from the start. In a way, the situation was a great benefit to the program because Mags could slowly start to build the station, Furthermore, he was the one who carried the lessons over from one school season to the next after each class of students graduated.

However, he didn't walk into the station and tell the students how it was going to be--at least in certain aspects. In 1973, the station was as new to Mags as it was to the kids. Every day, Mags' day included learning how to run the upstart operation, all the while playing the role of the teacher. So there was a lot of experimenting by all, yet Mags learned a few tricks along the way.

First of all, the students were the ones to do all of the work--and take all of the credit. Mags was certainly willing to do his share, but Mags has looked at it this way: if he did the work, then the students would learn nothing. Instead Mags remained in the background as a support mechanism pushing the kids forward. In his mind, it was the students' show to run, not his. And over the 25 years, he has probably spent no more than five minutes running any piece of equipment. Instead, he was the spark when the students needed a jumpstart; the consoler when things went wrong; the enforcer when the students had strayed, and the rewarder when the students hadn't strayed; and for this role, he was at times loved and hated by the students.

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