On March 1st, Rádio Universidade de Coimbra celebrates 40 years on air. Four decades marked by training, debate, and cultural programming that has helped shape the city’s soundscape.
Although officially founded in 1986, RUC’s roots go back to the 1940s, when the Experimental Radio Centre, then a section of the Associação Académica de Coimbra, broadcast internally across university facilities. It was a space for technical learning and creative experimentation — the seed of what would become a truly student-run university radio station. A radio made by students, for students, yet open to the world.
On March 1st, 1986, Rádio Universidade de Coimbra was officially established. In 1988, after being granted its broadcasting license, it began transmitting 24 hours a day on 107.9 FM, becoming the first media outlet entirely run by university students. Over the years, it established itself as a training ground for radio presenters, journalists, and technicians, while also standing out as a rare space of editorial freedom in the Portuguese radio landscape. It has served as the starting point for several careers in Portuguese journalism. Among those who began their careers there were journalists such as Sansão Coelho, Joaquim Reis, and Braga Cruz, who later established themselves nationally. Among its former members is Gonçalo Quadros, co-founder of Critical Software, a sign that RUC’s influence extends far beyond the media sector.
RUC has developed across multiple fronts: training, journalism, academic life, and culture. Every year, new voices join and learn the craft of radio firsthand — from newsroom writing to presenting, from field reporting to technical production. At the same time, it maintains a strong connection to university life, broadcasting academic serenades, student assemblies, and other symbolic university events.
In sports, it has broadcast Académica’s matches since 2001, with a distinctly passionate commentary that has become part of its identity. In music, it has established itself as a platform for discovery. The program Santos da Casa, on air since the 1990s, is one of the most emblematic examples of this mission. Dedicated to contemporary Portuguese music, it has given space to emerging artists before they reached wider audiences. Early demos, debut albums, and interviews that preceded now-established careers were first heard there. Artists such as Ornatos Violeta, The Gift, Capicua, and Linda Martini were featured on the station’s playlists and interviewed in the early stages of their careers, reinforcing RUC’s role as a platform for discovery.
More than just a frequency, RUC is a space for learning and collective creation — a project driven mainly by students, yet supported by former members and collaborators from the city, in a spirit of volunteerism that remains central to its identity. Here, learning happens by doing. Experimentation is encouraged. Critical thinking grows alongside the making of radio.
Four decades later, Rádio Universidade de Coimbra remains a school, a laboratory, and a stage. A station born within the university that has long since become an integral part of the city.
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