Jerry Liebman '48As 'Specs Howard', He Trains Broadcasters Across the Country
In 1970, when Jerry Liebman '48 opened the Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts, he attracted two students. "And they still haven't paid their tuition," he says wryly. Today, Liebman's school is the largest broadcasting school in the country. Nearly 9,000 graduates work in all forms of video and radio in 50 states and in many foreign countries.
Liebman opened the school after 20 successful years as a Top 40 disc jockey, including a number of years as half of the top-rated "Martin and Howard" comedy team at KYW in Cleveland and WXYZ in Detroit. Liebman was Howard --"Specs Howard." The name was an emblem of the era when radio executives expected their talent to change their names when they got an employment contract. The execs christened him "Specs," he says, because of his glasses, then chose his new last name out of the phone book at random. He bought another deejay's one-studio broadcasting school in Southfield, Mich., because he had enough of being on the air, but he didn't want to leave the business entirely.
From the beginning, one of Liebman's goals was to provide students with the experience that was sadly lacking in most radio and TV training courses. When he opened the school, Liebman says, there were "other broadcast schools -- of sorts. They were mostly correspondence schools, and they mostly dealt with voice. You would send in a tape, and you would get back a critique."
Instead, Liebman offered students hands-on experience in all aspects of radio, and eventually expanded to video as well. "Students get into the studios from week one," says Liebman. "They learn how to do every different position in the studio. They learn how every piece of equipment in the studio works and how to run that equipment." The school has 17 radio studios and three TV studios; its students also staff four radio stations that broadcast in the Detroit area.
Liebman proudly says that each year nearly all of the 400 students who complete the required eight months of coursework find jobs in broadcasting or related fields.
In addition to attracting students, the school also draws attention from others. Liebman says he hosted "a cabinet minister from England who came to observe how we did things to pattern an educational training facility on us." Liebman is the president and CEO of the school and, at 72, still participates in the daily corporate and financial responsibilities, but these days, he said, "my son is running the place."
When he entered Allegheny, Liebman never dreamed he would end up running a broadcast school. He spent his first three years as a history and political science major, planning to be a trial lawyer. His advisor suggested he take a speech and drama class to prepare him for the courtroom, and after writing a 15-minute radio drama, his major and his career goals changed. He graduated with a degree in radio, speech and dramatics, then borrowed $15,000 "from relatives, friends and people I didn't even know" to open a radio station. Now, looking back at a 50-year career in broadcasting, he said, "I don't know that I ever would have gone into anything else."
- Matt Sutton '99
