“We Should be the Student Television Alumni Network, or Something Like That”: A Decade of STAN

By Dan Orton - STAN Chair 2016 - 2019

What began as five alumni with a Google Doc and an overambitious three-year plan has become a genuinely lasting community…

Things don’t always go to plan. That’s one of my big takeaways from looking back through old documents and emails as we mark 10 years of the Student Television Alumni Network (STAN).

But things not always going to plan should be something anyone involved in student TV is acutely familiar with, and - to contradict Robert Burns for one moment - even if those best laid schemes of mice and men go awry, they actually do have a way of working out regardless. You’ll see what I mean.

This too shall PaSTA…

The story of STAN as we know it really begins 11 years ago (or nine, depending on which email chain you’re able to dig up…but I digress!) when it was proposed that the National Student Television Association (NaSTA) should have an official alumni association.

Before that, alumni-related events and outreach were the purview of the alumni officer, a member of the NaSTA executive committee. Ultimately, it was felt that NaSTA's ambitions for its alumni community, affectionately referred to as PaSTA (past-NaSTa…geddit?) was too much for one person.

In the spring of 2015, NaSTA opened up applications for the PaSTA steering group, a committee of five individuals who would spend a year working on a proposal for what an alumni association working with - but separately to - NaSTA, would look like.

Like most things in student television, it was built entirely by volunteers - people who had already graduated, but still cared enough to give up evenings and weekends to help the next generation.

I was one of those volunteers, and for your entertainment (and posterity!) I have uncovered my application form for the steering group buried at the bottom of an old Hotmail (!?) inbox.

There were 22 questions. Question 20 asked what I saw PaSTA ultimately becoming, and my answer in full is below:

I would very much like to see PaSTA – and indeed NaSTA – have the same standing within the media world as organisations like SRA and to attract the same level of attention as the Guardian Student Media Awards, and the RTS Student TV Awards. It will take a while, and will certainly involve persuading older alumni to take a more active role in the running of the association. PaSTA should be the first port of call for any student member looking for career advice. A name change may be necessary, I don’t know how seriously many people would take a group named after boiled wheat and water, as witty a pun as it undoubtedly is.

Back then, NaSTA was the scrappy underdog of the student media world, and to some extent it still is, but successive executive committees have built the association up and this year I was pleased to see alumni judges in no less than 12 out of 22 award categories (our highest yet, since we began keeping records). And we’ve outlived the Guardian Student Media Awards, which surely counts for something, right?

Oh, and we did change the name…

PaSTA la vista, baby!

In April 2016, at the NaSTA AGM in Leeds, I was tasked with presenting the steering group’s proposal for what would very soon be known as STAN, which we had crafted into a three-year plan.

I’ll be honest dear reader, I had largely forgotten the details of that plan, but the relevant Google doc lives in our shared STAN drive.

Over three years, the organisation (referred to multiple times as NAN, an acronym of NaSTA Alumni Network) aimed to establish, consolidate, and then expand an independent alumni network. The plan was ambitious: a mission statement and constitution, a website and newsletter, regional networking events, mentoring schemes, industry partnerships, fundraising initiatives, educational resources, internships, governance reforms and large-scale annual events.

With hindsight, we were wildly optimistic. Still, looking back at that document now, it is striking just how much of it eventually came to pass. Our timings were simply about seven years off.

Today, STAN is larger and more active than ever. The website and newsletter we envisioned are now long-established fixtures, with a growing readership and regular contributions from across the alumni network. Regional socials and networking events have become a core part of what we do too, with committee members organising gatherings in London, Leeds, Manchester and Cardiff whenever we can.

Some initiatives developed more organically than we originally imagined. Rather than focusing on one large annual alumni event, we found it was far more valuable to maintain a visible presence at the NaSTA conference and awards weekend itself, while also running smaller events throughout the year that current members and alumni could attend together.

Other projects exceeded our expectations entirely. Our mentoring and Ask an Alumni schemes are now entering their third year, connecting students and recent graduates with alumni and industry professionals who continue to volunteer their time long after leaving university. The CV Clinic, launched more recently, drew queues throughout the 2025 conference in Southampton and has quickly become one of our most popular initiatives. We’ve organised the judging panel for at least one award every year since 2017, second only - I think - to the great Tim Marshall.

Not every part of the original plan survived unchanged. Some proposals became unnecessary after NaSTA registered as a charity in 2018, while others quietly fell away as priorities shifted and the organisation evolved. But that adaptability has probably been one of STAN’s greatest strengths. As I said earlier, student television rarely goes exactly to plan, and perhaps alumni organisations shouldn’t either.

A great example of that was during the Covid-19 lockdowns in 2020, when we pivoted away from in-person events to a semi-regular online alumni quiz. It proved a success, kept us sane, and provided us with a model we could keep using even after the pandemic.

There were achievements we never anticipated as well. STAN played an important role in the decision to stop separating NaSTA’s on-screen performance awards by sex, making those categories more inclusive for everyone. We are still waiting for BAFTA to catch up.

And two years ago, we properly revived the NaSTA Fellowship, recognising alumni who made lasting contributions during their time in student television and continue to support the community years - sometimes decades - later. Volunteers have always been the backbone of both NaSTA and STAN.

I can’t find in the records exactly when we settled on STAN over NAN, but I do remember one member of the steering group pointing out that NAN was “an acronym of an acronym,” which would potentially make it just as hard to explain to outsiders as PaSTA.

The rebranded PaSTA (STAN) was supposed to be officially launched at NaSTA 2017, but somewhere along the line we clearly just got going with it and never looked back. The earliest reference to STAN that I can find is a note on a proposal document dated 16th January 2016, which is how we settled on 2026 being our 10th birthday.

“We should be the Student Television Alumni Network, or something like that.”

From that five-member steering group in 2016, we have grown to a 10-strong committee of dedicated volunteers from a wide range of student TV stations and media careers: journalists, entrepreneurs, broadcast engineers, producers, scriptwriters…the list goes on and on. Another eight people have come and gone, each bringing invaluable experience and insight to get us to where we are today.

I want to take this opportunity to name them all here, and to thank them.

Calum Brookes

Karl Taylor

Hugh Blackstaffe

Leah Blackaby

Emma Bew

Robert Sumner

Julian Waller

Nik Rahmel

Kayleigh Edwards

Josh Edwards

Rowan Johnson

Dom Kullander

Jack Train

Hannan McCann

Matt Robinson

Selin Izzet

Andrew Oldbury

And welcome to our latest committee members, Joe Lander and Tom Brown!

It’s been a decade of ups and downs, false starts and great leaps forward, and STAN has never been stronger. It’s been a real honour to have played a role in its development and I have great faith that it will continue to build on the lessons and successes of the past 10 years to become a real force in the industry. Here’s to another 10 years and the rest after that!