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ABC6 Columbus Chief Meteorologist Marshall McPeek remembers his time in Athens fondly, and says he remembers his entire experience at Ģ����Ƶ University as being inside the Radio and Television Building at WOUB.

“I started working at WOUB during the first quarter of my freshman year and it quickly became my life,” said McPeek. “I’m not sure when I had time for class. WOUB became what you did literally all day and all night. Whenever you weren’t in class you went to WOUB.”

McPeek grew up in Bucyrus, Ģ����Ƶ, where he started his broadcast career at WBCO-AM/WQEL-FM when he was just 14 years old. McPeek chose Ģ����Ƶ University for college because he wanted to study journalism.

“Ģ����Ƶ University has a wonderful reputation in communications and journalism,” said McPeek. “I didn’t even apply anywhere else.”

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McPeek was accepted into the Honors Tutorial College. He worked at South Green Radio, ACRN and WOUB, trying to take advantage of all the broadcast experience he could get. It didn’t take long for him to focus on WOUB.

“The experience I was able to get at WOUB, both on air and behind the scenes, was amazing,” said McPeek. “I was doing newscasts for AM and FM. I hosted a radio program called Afternoon Edition. I worked on WOUB TV’s NewsWatch, both in front and behind the camera. On nights I wasn’t anchoring, I was probably on the production side either as floor manager, audio operator or directing.”

McPeek made his national reporting debut while he was a student at WOUB. He was asked to submit an audio report for NPR.

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“I was asked to record a voicer for NPR’s All Things Considered. I had to coordinate with NPR in Washington D.C., and I was terrified. But I submitted it and then it aired on NPR. The anchor mispronounced my name, but I didn’t care because I was on NPR,” said McPeek with a laugh.

When McPeek graduated in 1991, he worked on the assignment desk at WEWS TV in Cleveland for a couple of years. Then he got a morning anchor/reporter/producer position at WSIL in Southern Illinois. Eventually he received his meteorology training from Mississippi State University and earned the American Meteorological Society's prestigious designation as a Certified Broadcast Meteorologist. After a few more stops in different TV markets, McPeek landed at NBC4 in Columbus.

“I moved to Columbus in January 2002 and was an anchor who also did weather for the weekend morning show,” said McPeek. “I also reported during the week. I did that for 11 years and eventually burned out. I left the business for about a year. But then Channel 6 asked if I wanted to come back to Columbus, and I did.”

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McPeek joined ABC6 in September of 2013 and was promoted to Chief Meteorologist in 2018. He is an Emmy award-winning meteorologist and journalist. He is thrilled with the opportunities that have been available during his career and thinks WOUB had a lot to do with getting him to where he is today.

“WOUB prepared us for everything. We were able to have the hands-on skills we needed to walk into a newsroom and do the job,” said McPeek. “WOUB is what makes Ģ����Ƶ University’s program better than anything else out there. Nowadays you have students leaving WOUB with Emmy awards. WOUB made sure we knew what we needed to know to hit the ground running.”