Category Archives: Diversity

Disability, Diversity, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – April 2018

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On 11th April it is World Parkinson’s Day and with that in mind we have chosen Rob Deering as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

Rob is a stand up comedian being one of the most in-demand headliners on the UK circuit, he’s toured nationally and performed solo shows at the Edinburgh Fringe many times since starting out in comedy in the year 2000. His late-night, live-music comedy pop quiz Beat is a festival institution, on London’s South Bank, at Wales’ Green Man and many more besides Edinburgh.

Rob has performed throughout the world, in shows from the Middle East to Melbourne, Shanghai to the South of France, and he has appeared many Radio and TV shows.

He has been a supporter of Parkinson’s UK since 2007. His father has Parkinson’s and encouraged Rob to get involved. Since then he has run marathons, featured on quiz shows, and set up a series of comedy nights in support.

In 2007 he won £24,000 for the charity during a special comedians’ edition of the Weakest Link, and he also won Celebrity Mastermind in 2014.

Rob is the brains behind Shake with Laughter, a series of comedy nights around the country which is now in its sixth successful year. He also performed for Parkinson’s UK at the Royal Albert Hall in Symfunny No.2 last year.

Rob is a keen marathon runner and is the Parkinson’s UK Champion of Running. Inspired by his father, Rob takes part in a number of running events every year, including the London Marathon which he has run six times.

To find out more about World Parkinson’s Day see here https://www.parkinsons.org.uk/get-involved/world-parkinsons-day

To find out more about Rob see here http://www.robdeering.com/biography/

Diversity, Ethnicity, Gender

‘Boxer Barbie’: Nicola Adams ‘honoured’ to be turned into doll

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Boxer Nicola Adams has been turned into a Barbie doll for International Women’s Day, which is on Thursday, 8 March.

Nicola, who has twice won Olympic gold medals, is the first UK star to join Barbie’s ‘Shero’ range – designed to honour inspiring women.

Manufacturers Mattel say they chose Nicola because of her outstanding contributions to boxing.

“I am so excited and honoured to be Barbie’s first ever UK Shero and the first ever boxer Barbie,” Nicola said.

The Nicola Adams doll has boxing gloves, boxing gear embroidered with her ‘Lioness’ nickname and her distinctive cropped hairstyle.  More

Disability, Diversity, Gender, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – March 2018

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LAURA JAMES – AUTHOR

On 26 March it is the start of World Autism Awareness Week and with this in mind we have chosen Laura James as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

In the UK, there are 700,000 people diagnosed with autism, according to the NAS. One of those people is Laura James. Laura is a journalist, author and columnist and her work has appeared in many national and international newspapers and magazines, and she’s the author of nine books.  Laura’s ninth book, Odd Girl Out, is a memoir focusing on her autism, the book tracks a year of her life as she comes to terms with the diagnosis.

Laura always felt like she was different – but it took more than 40 years for her to find out why.  At the age of 46 she was told she was autistic.  Laura was being tested for a condition related to Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a connective tissue disorder, when a nurse recognised she was having an autistic meltdown.  Laura presumed she had made a mistake but Laura visited her GP who referred her to a psychiatrist. After carrying out a six-hour assessment, she was given her autism diagnosis.

At first Laura told only her family and close friends and found telling her husband and children quite uneventful, everyone else found out when she wrote an article about her diagnosis for The Guardian.

Straight after her diagnosis things hadn’t changed very much, but then she had therapy which was amazing. Her therapist specialised in autism and understood how she thought and really helped with the things she found difficult.  Through therapy and writing and everything that came after she learned to identify her feelings, put in to perspective the reason she always felt very fearful and learnt coping strategies like wearing noise cancelling headphones.

Laura feels passionate about breaking the lingering stereotypes around autism and normalising the condition in conversation.  She feels that ‘It doesn’t make you less of a person, just different.’

In an article for Good Housekeeping magazine Laura about her life and book said the following:

‘I want neurotypical women to read it so autism isn’t this big scary thing,’ Laura says.

‘When I was growing up people didn’t speak about depression – there was a proper stiff upper lip, whereas now there’s loads of people talking about health and wellbeing, including the royals.

‘If we could get to that stage with autism, where it’s mainstream and normalised, I think the world will be a much better place.’

To find out more about Laura see here

https://twitter.com/girl_by_the_aga

and to find out more World Autism Week see here

http://www.autism.org.uk/get-involved/world-autism-awareness-week.aspx

 

 

Diversity, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month, LGBT

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – February 2018

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February is LGBT History Month and with that in mind we have chosen Heather Peace as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

Heather is an actor and musician studying at Manchester Met University.  She has appeared in a number of well-known TV series including Emmerdale, London’s Burning, Ultimate Force, Waterloo Road and Prey.  She has been a classically trained pianist since the age of six and held a jazz residency at a club whilst at university.

Heather divides her time between acting and her music.  She has released numerous albums and tours regularly in the UK, Europe and currently in Australia.

Heather and her longtime partner Ellie Dickinson entered into a civil partnership in 2013, and subsequently converted it to marriage in 2014 and they have three daughters together.

Heather is a prominent supporter of LGBT equality causes. She is a patron of Manchester Pride and has recorded a video for Stonewall‘s “It Gets Better” campaign. She is involved in a number of related charities, including Diversity Role Models and The Albert Kennedy Trust.

She has hosted and curated her own “Heather Peace Presents” stage in several editions of Manchester Pride and in July 2016 Diva announced that Heather was its new columnist.

In 2010 she was number 40 on the Independent on Sunday‘s Pink List, and number 10 in 2011. She was also voted number 18 on US website afterellen.com’s 2011 Hot 100 list. She is also the only woman to have appeared twice on the cover of Diva Magazine in the space of six months.

To find out more about Heather’s music see here http://www.heatherpeace.com/ and for her acting see here http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0668698/

To find out more about Diversity Role Models see their website at https://www.diversityrolemodels.org/ and the Albert Kennedy Trust at https://www.akt.org.uk/

 

Diversity, Equality, Ethnicity, Gender, Inclusion, Race

Football Association adopts ‘Rooney Rule’ as Martin Glenn outlines 2018 plans

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The Football Association will interview at least one applicant from a black, Asian and minority ethnic background for future roles in the England set-up.

English football’s governing body will adopt its own version of the ‘Rooney Rule’ implemented in the NFL in 2003.

Chief executive Martin Glenn said the move showed the “FA is for all”.

“The FA wants to become a more inclusive organisation where the workforce more represents the people who play football today,” Glenn said.

Speaking to BBC Sport, he added: “What it will say is the opportunity to have a career beyond playing is something that the FA is serious about promoting.”  More

Disability, Diversity, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – January 2018

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World Braille Day takes place on 4 January and with that in mind we have chosen Gary Waite as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the month.

Gary is a photographer who only took up taking photos after he lost his sight.  He found out he had a hereditary eye condition, retinitis pigmentosa, at the age of 19. It was a total shock to him as it is women in a family who are carriers and the men get it. Two of his brothers and one nephew have the condition.

To begin with, he tried his best not to be associated with the condition. He didn’t want to be seen that way and throughout the Eighties he was hiding. He was able to play football with his mates, but would then bump into people on nights out. He tried a lot of jobs; including an electrician and a plumber; but it was too dangerous.

Eventually, he became depressed and his eyesight was getting worse when, in the early Nineties, he went to Moorfields Hospital and met an amazing woman named Barbara Norton, in the social work department, who helped him to get in touch with support groups.

Then, aged around 40, Gary’s eyesight went completely and it was while attending an IT course for visually impaired and blind people in Camberwell that he heard about the charity PhotoVoice.  Gary wasn’t interested at first and then, his curiosity overcame him. From the moment he lifted a digital SLR camera and started to experiment and ask questions, he was hooked. And he became really good at it.

It helped that Gary had not been blind from birth and knew what colours were but he needs to use his other senses particularly sound and touch and he uses his cane to be able to work out how to take the photo.

He always have someone with him and they go through the photos and have them described and together they edit the ones to delete or keep.

To find out more about PhotoVoice see here https://photovoice.org/our-partners/

To find out more about World Braille Day see here

https://www.timeanddate.com/holidays/world/world-braille-day

Diversity, Ethnicity, Race

BBC to air more religious programming

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The BBC has pledged to “raise our game” on religion by increasing the portrayal of all faiths in mainstream shows.

The corporation said it would “enhance” the representation of religion on TV and radio dramas and documentaries.

It said it would also create a new global religious affairs team, headed by a religion editor, in BBC News.

The BBC will also keep Thought For The Day on Radio 4’s Today programme – despite presenter John Humphrys saying it’s often “deeply, deeply boring”.  More

Disability, Diversity, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – November 2017

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World Diabetes Day is on 14 November and with that in mind we have chosen James Norton as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

James is an actor best known for his roles in the TV series’ Happy Valley, Grantchester and War and Peace. He was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in 2010 at the start of his acting career. He finds managing his diabetes challenging but he has not let it get in his way and refuses to let the condition hold him back from success.

James is a supporter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and their #T1DLooksLikeMe campaign which aims to help educate others about Type 1 diabetes.

To find out more about James see here http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3584268/ .

To find out more about the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and World Diabetes Day see the links below.

https://jdrf.org.uk/

http://www.diabetes.co.uk/World-Diabetes-Day.html