Broadcast Spotlight: Shaila Scott

Shaila Scott has a lot to celebrate in 2018. This is her 30th year on the radio in New York City, currently as midday host on WBLS, the station this Harlem native grew up listening to.

While in high school, Shaila was inspired to be a broadcaster when she met longtime ABC-TV weatherman Spencer Christian at a career-day event. She asked him for a tour of ABC’s Channel 7 studios. “The people I met there said they never felt they worked a day in their life because they loved what they did,” she said. Shaila attended SUNY College at Buffalo. “I knew that I was going to major in broadcasting, but I didn’t know if it was TV or radio or journalism. At a contest at school, one of the judges was a disc jockey at WBLK, and he said there was a part-time job. So I went to the radio production center, did a couple of spots and a commercial. I also had to change my New York City accent. For a supermarket commercial I said, ‘ahr-un-jezz’ for ‘oranges’, and was told you can’t say ‘ahr-un-jezz’ here! A month later, they offered me overnights, so I took that and went to school part-time. I finished college a year later than I would have, but it was worth it.”

She was frustrated in her early attempts to come back to New York City. She sent 11 audition tapes to WBLS and never got a response, even though one of the tapes had been hand-delivered by a friend who worked at the company. She decided to train to be a flight attendant and look for work in other markets: “I’ll drop my tapes all over the country for free,” she said. Then came the break she was hoping for. “My last day in Buffalo, I told my listeners I was leaving and opened up the phone lines. On the request line was [WBLS Program Director] B.K. Kirkland.” She thought the call was a prank, but became a believer when Kirkland mentioned Sylvia Schoultz, the friend who had delivered her audition tape. Shaila returned home to New York to start working one day a week at WBLS, where she was mentored by, among others, legendary New York disc jockeys Vaughn Harper (“my radio daddy,” she calls him) and Frankie Crocker. In the 30 years since, she’s worked at WBLS, KISS-FM and now on a second stint at WBLS.

Shaila has an inviting, easygoing and enthusiastic on-air sound, but her audience connection goes deeper. Even at the beginning of her career, she would conclude each airshift with an uplifting message, a “progressive thought,” as she calls it. One day a listener told her, “I was contemplating suicide, and hearing what you said made me look at things differently. It changed my life.” Another listener, recognizing her in a store, burst into tears, telling Shaila that one of those messages (now called the “Sisterly Kiss”) had helped restore her relationship with her son. The deep reach of these listener connections inspired Shaila to create Shaila’s Sisterly Kiss, an organization that has raised money and awareness for breast cancer research, AIDS prevention and other charities. This year will mark the 10th annual Sisterly Kiss Mother’s Day Spa Party, a benefit for victims of domestic violence who are treated to a day of manicures, makeovers and motivational speakers.

Shaila is increasingly grateful for union presence in her career. “[SAG-AFTRA Assistant Executive Director, Labor Counsel] Peter Fuster is such a blessing in my life. I was glad that I joined the union, but I didn’t really understand what they do for us until I saw how [then-]AFTRA helped Vaughn when he got sick and had challenges on the job. Vaughn held the union in such high regard. He said, ‘If it wasn’t for the union, I don’t know what I would do.’”

As she celebrates three decades on New York’s airwaves, Shaila is grateful for the people she’s met along the way, starting with her mentors. She’s helping to build the next generation of performers, too. Her daughter, Scottie Beam, is a radio and television personality, podcaster and social-media “influencer,” who, Shaila says, is finding her own path to success in today’s media environment. And she treasures the colleagues of her own generation. “One thing about New York radio, to me, it’s all been like family. We can be on competing radio stations, we’re all trying to get the best ratings we possibly can, but at the end of the day, we’re just genuine friends. I am so grateful for those friendships.”

Photo credit: WBLS