The plug will officially be pulled on SCOLA today after the STV-9 programming dodged its scheduled cancellation date almost a month ago.

SCOLA (Satellite Communications for Learning) includes international newscasts and programming in the native languages of more than 50 different countries.

SCOLA was originally scheduled to be taken off the student-run channel Dec. 18, but because SCOLA did not receive the billing numbers during winter break, it “let us keep running,” said Steve Coon, faculty adviser to STV-9 and associate professor of journalism and mass communication.

In addition to STV-9, the primary sources of SCOLA’s funding were the Council on International Programs and the Office of International Students and Scholars.

Both organizations withdrew their funding due to the programming’s doubled cost increase.

Coon said the annual cost of SCOLA is about $5,500, and that STV-9 does not have the means to cover the total cost.

Michael Irwin, general manager of STV-9 and sophomore in journalism and mass communication, said he would like the station to provide some international programming, but he agreed that SCOLA was too expensive for STV-9 to keep on the air.

“It’s a good educational tool, but it’s extremely costly,” he said. “STV-9 cannot fund it. We don’t have the money for that.”

The fact that STV-9 relied on a satellite for SCOLA made the programming “fairly unreliable,” Irwin said.

Both Irwin and Coon said there has been little to no feedback about the cancellations of SCOLA.

“We heard nothing for a long time, then I received two or three e-mails from graduate students,” Irwin said, adding that the graduate students used SCOLA as a teaching tool in their classes.

Coon agreed, saying that if “there has been a negative reaction about SCOLA, it has not reached any of us at STV-9.”

He also said through informal conversations, he has heard that the majority of international students are relying on the Internet for news about their home countries instead of SCOLA.

However, Coon said he thought SCOLA did “provide a certain function” on STV-9.

The programming that will replace SCOLA will be a combination of community calendar listings and more original programming, Coon said.

Coon said he does not know if SCOLA will ever return to STV-9.