International students may be at a loss when turning on the tube to Iowa State’s cable channel STV-9 in a quest for programming from their home country.

Mike Irwin, the station’s general manager and sophomore in journalism and mass communication, said STV-9 has learned that the funding for the channel’s SCOLA (Satellite Communications for Learning) programming has been cut.

SCOLA, according to its Web site, is a “non-profit education consortium that receives and re-transmits television programming from more than 50 different countries in their original languages.”

Irwin said the programming is transmitted via satellite to the university 24 hours a day. STV-9 then pre-empts the international programming with its own locally produced shows and other network programming, such as the Burly Bear network.

Steve Coon, faculty adviser of STV-9 and associate professor of journalism and mass communication, said SCOLA informed him of the funding cut about a week ago.

“[The SCOLA bill] hasn’t been paid for 1998,” Coon said.

Coon said the annual cost for the programming is $5,552.64.

Coon said SCOLA had been funded in past years partly by the Counsel on International Programs and the Office of International Students and Scholars (OISS).

Edwin Lewis, associate provost and chair of the Counsel on International Programs, said there are three reasons that the counsel has decided to stop funding SCOLA.

First, he said the “cost has more than doubled” since the counsel originally agreed to fund the programming.

The next reason Lewis gave for the lack of funding is the closing of the account used to fund SCOLA.

Lewis also said the foreign language departments rely less on SCOLA for supplemental instruction than they once did.

He said that OISS informed him that international students are relying more heavily on the Web for news.

Irwin said STV-9, with its minimal budget, cannot afford to bear the burden of paying for SCOLA out of its own pocket.

Irwin also said losing SCOLA has “never been something [STV-9] has really had to deal with” because the funding was always provided to the station.

Coon said STV-9 has carried the international programming for at least six years.

Elefterios Lidorikis, graduate student in physics from Greece, watches Greek news on SCOLA about two times a week.

“It’s the only time you get to see your language on [American] T.V.,” he said.

Marc Ruehlaender, also a graduate student in physics and GSB international senator, watches German SCOLA programming on the weekends.

“It’s nice to have news from your own country in your own language,” he said.

Lidorikis said it “would be good for the name of Iowa State” if the university would fund the programming.

“We’re talking about $1 per international student,” he said.