April 1, 2023
By Hailey Evers, Staff Writer
ROCKLAND- Rocco’s Rewind is a radio show that is recorded at the WRPS station at Rockland High School. The host of the show is sophomore Rocco Correia, and sometimes he has guest DJs making appearances on the show.
You can listen to him on WRPS 88.3 FM every Wednesday at 3 p.m.
Correia was inspired to do his own show by his fifth-grade teacher, Mrs. Fallon.
“She actually mentioned the idea of WRPS to me and she was like ‘oh you’d be great at it’ and I was like alright and then the first day of high school I went there and was like I want a radio show and then it bloomed from there,” Correia said. “It’s easy, don’t overcomplicate it, talk as professionally as possible, and have fun that’s a key element.”
Students that want to start a show of their own can come down to WRPS and talk to Lisa Breeden and ask her any questions.
“It has to start with your passion or you're wanting to do it and just come and talk to us and we’ll go from there,” Ms. Breeden said.
Every student has the chance to start a radio show or podcast with WRPS and they can express themselves the way they choose.
Ms. Breeden said, “Once they come in and talk to us and we work on a schedule then they get trained on how to use the technical aspects of doing a show, but the talent comes from the students themself. And so basically I’m there to help them get things up and running.”
Rocco’s favorite part of having the show is making people’s day.
The first guest on Rocco’s rewind show was dean Mr. Fred Damon.
“Yeah one day we are going to all say we knew Rocco before he’s really famous because he is going to become famous,” Mr. Damon said.
Mr. Damon was listening to WRPS while driving home one day and heard Rocco’s request for teachers to get involved.
“I instant messaged Rocco and said ‘hey, listen I’m going to come on your show, and from there it has taken off and now he has everybody doing it so it’s a good thing,” Mr. Damon said.
Mr. Damon said, “My favorite part is just to interact with Rocco and have a good time. You know the music is a good thing but the banter back and forth between me and Rocco.
In addition to Mr. Damon, Correia has also had other teachers guest DJs, including English teacher Mr. Chad Bigsby, history teacher Mr. Randal Grimmett, and math teacher Mr. Richard Little.
Rocco has added some things to the show that he didn’t have last year which was starting to have guests on the show.
Ms. Breeden said, “Rocco has been with us for over a year, and last year he was really focused on just doing his show and week to week coming up with music it was great. This year he took it a whole step further.”
Rocco comes up with ideas for his show on his own.
Ms. Breeden said, “We encounter a Rocco maybe once a decade if we’re lucky and I tell people because a lot of my other student DJs probably think we give him preferential treatment but we don’t, he comes up with these ideas himself and we just help him facilitate it.”
You can buy Rocco’s Rewind merchandise at https://www.zazzle.com/store/roccos_rewind