NAACP Awards | Centennial grad brings soul to local airwaves

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URBANA — Illinois Soul, a public radio station broadcasting content made by and for Black people, is the first of its kind in the U.S., but it was a no-brainer to Jill Clements.

“We know from history that nobody was super-serving this audience any more,” Clements said. “There was no one taking on this missing, and we unapologetically decided to do so.”

A “homegrown Champaign” girl and Centennial High School grad, Clements became the first female program director of her college radio station at Southern Illinois University.

After graduation “I moved to Chicago with $200, no job and a dream,” she said, but it worked out: her first job was working on the pilot of “In Living Color.”

After a few years of freelance and other work, Clements took a job at Chicago radio station V103, where she worked on what is now called the Black Women’s Expo, bringing in guests like Maya Angelou, Susan Taylor and Oprah Winfrey.

She also worked on the World’s Largest Steppers Competition and, after relocating to Champaign, won an Illinois Press Association Award for a special section she organized on Black history.

A major facet of Clements’ entire career has been facilitating events, entertainment and news for Black audiences, often specifically Black women.

“That’s the demographic I know. It’s me, it’s my friends, it’s my sisters,” Clements said.

Now, she’s continuing that work with Illinois Public Media.

On Saturday, she’ll be honored for her work on the station with a Media Trailblazer Award from the Champaign County branch of the NAACP. Her co-worker, IPM director of news and public affairs Reginald Hardwick, is also among the six who’ll be saluted.

While Clements might be inspired to create for fellow Black folks to support her community, she said it’s also just good business.

“We are a very highly desired demographic by different companies and agencies because we are decision makers. We’re trendsetters,” Clements said. “We’ve always been at the forefront, and this is just a way to be seen and heard and celebrated.”

That might explain why the idea for Illinois Soul came from Clements in the sales department, which is not a normal source for a new project to go on air.

Still, Clements said, they aren’t doing this for ratings or money.

The goal for the station, which has a local Chambana angle but intends to be accessible to a state- and nationwide audience, is what Clements calls “FUBU” — content “for us, by us.”

“We’re all about community. ... It’s about impact and inspiring and entertaining Black communities,” Clements said. “We’re nine months old and we’re getting all this acknowledgement, and that’s beautiful, that’s the fun part, but the work is the longevity of this and leaving a legacy.”

Clements wants to see Illinois Soul bring together the local community and the University of Illinois campus, but she also wants to see it outlive her.

She wants to make sure the station has stability and people who care about keeping it running, because it isn’t lacking for an audience or content to fill the airwaves.

To someone who isn’t used to marketing to or creating content for a niche audience, the concept of “Black entertainment” or “Black news” might sound a little odd.

But Clements said it doesn’t have to be complicated.

For one, Illinois Soul focuses on music like R&B that has major ties to Black culture.

On the news side, way before taking the station live, IPM brought in focus groups and sent out surveys to find out from Black people what topics they cared to hear about.

Responses naturally suggested a wide variety of topics, which included entrepreneurship, parenting, technology and mental health.

Illinois Soul also broadcasts more general news, of course.

“Brutality impacts us differently than other audiences. The economy impacts us differently. When we went through COVID, that impacted us differently,” Clements said.

“It is general things, but the effect on the Black community is different because it is not a level playing field out here. Everybody’s not starting at the same place.”

Around nine months after launch, Illinois Soul has already received multiple awards and Clements said that events have been well-attended by folks of all ages.

The station even got a subtle shout-out as part of a “Late Night with Seth Myers” bit very shortly after launch.

“Illinois Soul is just a super bold step,” Clements said. “In leadership, you’ve got to be bold. Everybody’s saying they want this audience, ‘but we don’t know how to attract it, how do we do this?’

“We’re showing them how. This will be emulated all across the country.”