Congratulations –

Andrew Hynes, CFUV-FM

As a fresh new volunteer to CFUV the same year, Andrew Hynes spent the lion’s share of 2019 dedicating himself to the production of CFUV’s podcasts. He came in with little prior experience, but quickly moved through the training process to become one of the most highly skilled members of our Spoken Word team. He threw ideas into the ring during our concept creation phase; he interviewed guests who were critical to the stories we told—always conveying a genuine sense of interest, patience, and enthusiasm; he spent many a late night talking through stories and fleshing out ideas with fellow volunteers and producers, all while having an incredibly upbeat and positive attitude—bringing laughter, ease, and excitement to whomever he crossed paths with at the Station. More specifically, Hynes supported the Spoken Word team by: getting deep into research on topics such as the rise and fall of pet rabbits on the Uvic Campus for the episode “The Saga of the Uvic bunnies”; recording his friends going through the process of writing anonymous Rate My Prof reviews in order to reveal the pitfalls and gender biases of the site for “Rate My Backlash”; attending the opera in order to get firsthand experience for the episode “Old Italian People Singing”; interviewing law enforcement about stolen data and a very cryptic note for the episode “Cold Case: Uvic Edition”; learning about Victoria’s earthquake response plan for “The Big One”; speaking candidly about his own experience of performing at open mic nights for the episode “First Entrance Into Public Opinion”; getting the ‘hot goss’ behind Uvic’s Confessions and Crushes Facebook page for “The Admins”; interviewing local musicians to hear their take on how Victoria’s housing crisis is impacting our local music scene for “13 municipalities, No Jam Spaces”…and on and on. The generosity of spirit, time, energy, and skill that Hynes shared with our Station throughout 2019 is incomparable. We are ever grateful. He is truly our “Volunteer of the Year.”