Carol Olson

Carol Olson has been involved in community led independent radio since 2013. She produces a variety of radio shows and develops projects and programming to bring radio to the community. Carol has served in various leadership roles at the Virginia Center for Public Press and it's radio station: WRIR-LP 97.3 FM. She was President from 2015 - 2020, News and Public Affairs Chair from 2014 - 2018, Operations co- chair from 2018 - 2020. In 2019, she launched a new division of Virginia Center for Public Press, Richmond Independent Video. During her tenure she also developed and launch specialized community programs: Local Voices Live, an annual event creating radio in front of a live audience; Women in Audio, an annual event training women and nonbinary folks in all aspects of radio creation across newstalk and music; and Feminist Edit-A-Thons, workshops training women in Wikipedia editing and increasing the knowledge of women in radio online. She also secured funding and created partnerships in the community to help local community organizations develop community radio shows and teams to increase the voices of the LGBTQ community and increase racial diversity on the air. In tandem with radio, Carol has worked in advocacy and activism since 2006. She has held leadership positions in several anti-violence advocacy agencies, both locally and nationally where she has worked to bring membership and support to the mission to place women and girls’ lives as well as their particular struggles squarely within the context of the larger social justice concerns of communities. She is committed to the work of building movements where gender matters in broader social justice organizing so that all members of our communities gain social, political and economic equity.