Radio Educación, XEPPM: Mexican cultural radio on 6185 kHz

What you hear

Radio Educación is the opposite of commercial Mexican radio: no jingles, no shouting, no advertising. The programme is cultural in the broad sense, in Spanish, with long blocks of classical music, jazz and Mexican traditional music, readings and discussions of literature, radio documentaries, history, science talks and programmes for children. The announcers speak slowly and clearly, which makes the station a pleasant listen even with limited Spanish. On shortwave the station identifies with its callsign, XEPPM, alongside the name, and the identification is one of the easiest ways to confirm you have Mexico rather than one of the other 49 metre band stations around it.

The signal is modest. This is a low-power transmitter by international standards, and the audio arrives thin and fluttery over long paths. In North America at night it is a comfortable signal; further away it is a catch.

Who transmits and why

Radio Educación is a public broadcaster of the Mexican federal government, based in Mexico City and run under the culture ministry. It began as an educational station in the 1920s and in its modern form has existed since the late 1960s, with a remit to broadcast culture and education rather than to compete for ratings. The shortwave transmitter, XEPPM on 6185 kHz, is a small adjunct to the station's medium wave and online outlets, kept on the air for listeners in rural Mexico and for the handful of people abroad who still look for Mexico on the dial. Why a station with so little commercial logic keeps a shortwave outlet at all is a question the station answers simply: it is cheap, it works, and someone is listening.

When and where to listen

6185 kHz is in the 49 metre band, so the signal travels after dark and not before. From the United States and Canada the station is heard through the evening and night, with the best signal from late evening local time, and a receiver in Texas, the south-west or Mexico itself gives a clean copy. Europe is hard: the path from Mexico City crosses the Atlantic on a band that is crowded with European and Brazilian stations, and the Mexican signal is weaker than most of them. The realistic window from Europe is the last two hours before the European sunrise in winter, with 6180 kHz from Brazil pressing on one side. Many European listeners have never heard it; a few have, on quiet nights in December and January.

The catalogue mode is AM. Because of the neighbours, upper or lower sideband with a narrow filter is often the only way to separate XEPPM from the band around it, and a receiver with good selectivity matters more than a receiver with high gain.

In ShackDeck

The entry is under Station catalogue → Shortwave broadcast → Radio Educación Mexico. ShackDeck picks a public receiver whose range covers 6185 kHz, tunes it and sets AM from the catalogue, so you need no receiver, antenna or account of your own. For a first listen, ask for a receiver in the southern United States or Mexico and come back later for the European attempt.