Network Knowledge
In the 1990s, changes were made to the original 1970s D.L. Marley & Associates design of 5 broadcast facilities due to regional, political and consortium membership changes as well as the re-alignments of the state's higher educational system.
For name and brand consistency of the three Convocom broadcast facilities FCC calligns were changed in 1989: WJPT became WSEC, WIUM-TV became WMEC, and WQEC remained unchanged.
On July 1, 1995 Governor Jim Edgar signed a bill which abolished the Board of Regents and merged Sangamon State University with the University of Illinois system, making it the University of Illinois at Springfield.
Western Illinois University was directed by State of Illinois to expand its Quad Cities presence, Western Illinois University-Quad Cities; John Deere Corporation and Moline Foundation provided the land grant to WIU for its Riverfront campus.
In 1997, WMEC's transmitter site was moved to a new 430' (131 m) tower southeast of Colchester, near Fandon from its previous WIUM-FM tower location (1984-1997) on WIU's Horn Campus, south of Macomb.
In 1998, in order to address the fringe signal in Springfield from WSEC at Waverly, a 1,400 watt translator was built in the city originally broadcasting on channel 65 as W65BV. This translator was moved to VHF channel 8 in 2001 and became W08DP. The national PBS network recognizes WMEC in Macomb as the primary station for the Springfield translator, even though the corporation's headquarters are located in Chatham, southwest of Springfield.
In the late 1990s, digital television transition began for all television broadcast stations in the United States. This required engineering reviews, equipment upgrades, and operational changes in order to continue broadcasting to the desired geographical service region.
In March 2002, master control was moved from Peoria to Chatham with the completion of a fully digital master control facility and interconnection system. The WSEC transmitter site was moved from Waverly to a new 976' (295 m) tower in Franklin.
A new interconnection system composed of digital microwave (90 Mbs) and fiber-optic cabling was designed and implemented with the relocation of master control. It extends from Chatham through Franklin (WSEC's transmitter site) to Golden where it splits and sends a fiber signal to Quincy for WQEC and a microwave signal to Macomb for WMEC. There are also linkages to television studios in Quincy at WGEM (NBC affiliate) and in Macomb at Western Illinois University.
In 2004, after completion of system changes and migration to digital broadcasting, the corporation adopted the brand name Network Knowledge and retired the Convocom brand name after 27 years of use.
The network's geographic service region is now defined by the 3 broadcast facilities at Franklin (Springfield/Jacksonville), Macomb, and Quincy.
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