Category Archives: Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

Disability, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

InSpirational Diversity Champion of the Month – March 2021

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World Hearing Day is on 3 March and with that in mind we have chosen Eshaan Akbar as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

Eshaan Akbar is a comedian who began performing stand-up in 2014. He has appeared on many tv shows including ‘Frankie Boyle’s New World Order’, BBC Two’s ‘Big Asian Stand Up’, as well as on BBC Radio 4’s ‘The Now Show’, BBC Asian Network, and is a regular on TalkSPORT and LoveSport.

Eshaan, who is a proud hearing aid wearer, has been a staunch supporter of Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID) having performed in their Laughing to Deaf comedy fundraiser for two consecutive years, featured in #DontBeADonut campaign for Deaf Awareness Week in 2019, and acted as a spokesperson in the national media, including ITV.

A regular face on the comedy circuit, Eshaan has supported Micky Flanagan, Dane Baptiste, Hal Cruttenden, Rory Bremner, and Jan Ravens.  

His show ‘Prophet Like It’s Hot’ at the Soho Theatre was a sell out, following a successful run at the 2018 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Eshaan is a celebrity Ambassador for the Action on Hearing Loss charity.

To find out more about Eshaan see here

https://www.speakerscorner.co.uk/speaker/eshaan-akbar To find out more about World Hearing Day see here https://www.who.int/activities/celebrating–world–hearing–day/

Disability, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – December 2020

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On 3 December it is International Day of Persons with Disabilities and with that in mind we have chosen Warwick Davis as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

Warwick began his career at the age of 11 when film producer George Lucas put out a call for actors under four feet tall. Soon Warwick was battling Stormtroopers in a galaxy far, far away as Wicket the Ewok in Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. From there he went on to star in Willow, had several parts in the Harry Potter movies and has made numerous appearances in the Star Wars movies since.

He is also well known through his work on TV, including portraying a fictionalised version of himself in the Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant sitcom, Life’s Too Short. He also starred in a season of the comedy travel show An Idiot Abroad with Karl Pilkington. Warwick has also appeared with survivalist Bear Grylls on Bear’s Mission with Warwick Davis.

In 2014 Warwick became the first disabled person to regularly present a primetime show when he hosted ITV’s Celebrity Squares. For the last four years he’s presented ITV’s quiz show Tenable.

Warwick helps others build careers in show business through the talent agency Willow Management, which he co-founded. The agency specialises in representing actors under five foot tall, working for positive representation and more than niche roles.

He also founded the Reduced Height Theatre Company which casts theatrical productions entirely with actors who are little people, giving talented short actors a platform and also produced a musical, Eugenius!, which has had multiple theatre runs.

Warwick co-founded the charity Little People UK, which provides support to people with dwarfism and their families.

To find out more about International Day of Persons with Disabilities see here https://www.un.org/en/observances/day-of-persons-with-disabilities

To find out more about Warwick see here http://www.warwickdavis.co.uk/ To find out more about Little People UK see here https://littlepeopleuk.org/

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month, LGBT

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – February 2021

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February is LGBT History Month and with that in mind we have chosen the Elton John Aids Foundation as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

After losing friends and peers to AIDS-related illnesses, Elton John was inspired to set up the Elton John AIDS Foundation in 1992.

They fund projects for the prevention, treatment and education of HIV/AIDS and prioritise the most marginalised groups: gay men, adolescents, people who inject drugs, sex workers and transgender women. On top of this, the Foundation battles the stigma surrounding HIV/AIDS; as Elton John himself said, “The AIDS disease is caused by a virus, but the AIDS epidemic is not. The AIDS epidemic is fuelled by stigma, by hate, by misinformation.” The Foundation also runs various fundraising events, including the star-studded Academy Awards Viewing Party.

The Foundation’s mission is simple: to be a powerful force in the end to the AIDS epidemic. They are committed to no more discrimination. No more HIV infections. No more AIDS deaths. No matter who or where you are.

They believe AIDS can be beaten. But only if everyone at risk of HIV, no matter who they are or where they are has access to the non-discriminatory HIV information and compassionate care that allow them to stay healthy and safe and live with dignity.

To find out more about the Foundation see here https://www.eltonjohnaidsfoundation.org/

To find out more about LGBT History Month see here https://lgbtplushistorymonth.co.uk/

Disability, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the month – January 2021

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World Braille Day is on 4 January and with that in mind we have chosen Libby Clegg as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.

Libby is a champion Paralympian athlete who has a deteriorating eye condition known as Stargardt’s Macular Dystrophy disease giving her only slight peripheral vision in her left eye and she is registered blind.

Formerly a keen ballet dancer, Libby took up athletics aged 10, first competing in middle distance and cross country running before taking up sprinting, she burst onto the international scene aged 16 at the 2006 World Championships in Assen, the Netherlands, when she won a silver medal in the T12 200m.

Libby made her Paralympic debut in Beijing in 2008, winning a silver medal in the T12 100m. Later that year, she was awarded third place in the BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year.  At London 2012, Libby won her T12 100m heat in a world record time of 12.17 seconds to qualify for the semi-finals and in the final, she ran a time of 12.13 to set a new personal best and take the silver medal.

Crowned Commonwealth Champion in 2014, Libby had to miss a number of major competitions through illness and injury. She was reclassified as a T11 sprinter in 2016 and went on to set a world record in the T11 200m at July’s IPC Athletics Grand Prix Final. Libby began working with guide runner Chris Clarke in February 2016 and the pair claimed T11 100m and 200m gold at Rio 2016.

In April 2019 Libby and her partner Dan Powell became parents to son Edward, however she was training by the summer, competing at the World Championships later that year.

In 2017 she was awarded an MBE for services to athletics and charity and has been awarded Scottish Athletics Athlete of the year a record seven times.

Libby is an Ambassador for Guide Dogs for the Blind and has her own guide dog Hattie and helps to support them by raising issues in the media.

To find out more about World Braille Day see here https://brailleworks.com/what-is-world-braille-day/ To find out more about Libby see here https://www.paralympic.org/libby-clegg

Diversity, Equality, Gender, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month, LGBT, Transgender

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – November 2020

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20 November is Transgender Day of Remembrance and with that in mind we have chosen Annie Wallace as our Diversity Champion of the Month.

Annie is an actor from Aberdeen. A former National Youth Theatre member, she graduated from the Manchester Metropolitan School of Theatre in 2004 and has appeared in many theatre productions. As well as being a performer, Annie writes and records music and is a skilled sound recordist and designer.

Annie is a patron of Mermaids a charity supporting trans and gender diverse children, young people and their families.  Mermaids started small but has now evolved into one of the UK’s leading LGBTQ+ charities.

On 29 October 2015, Annie made history by becoming the first transgender person to play a regular transgender character in a British soap opera when she debuted as school headteacher, Sally St. Claire in Channel 4’s Hollyoaks.

Since starting in Hollyoaks, she has been regularly listed in the prestigious Rainbow List, Pride Power List, Diva Power List, and the USA OUT100, as one of the country’s most influential LGBT people.

She is a staunch supporter of transgender children, young people and their families. Her advocacy has seen her appear on Celebrity Mastermind, with Mermaids as her charity of choice.

To find out more about Annie see here

BIO

To find out more about Mermaids see here

About Mermaids

To find out more about Transgender Day of Remembrance see here https://www.awarenessdays.com/awareness-days-calendar/transgender-day-of-rembrance-2020/

Diversity, Equality, Ethnicity, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month, Race

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – October 2020

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October is Black History Month and also on 16 October it is World Food Day.  With that in mind we have chosen Marcus Rashford as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the month.

Marcus is a professional footballer who plays for Manchester United.  He was bought by his mum who often struggled to afford food to provide meals for Marcus and his siblings.

The issue of food poverty for families and children had always therefore been something that Marcus was very keen to help with and he has been working with the charity FareShareUK to raise money to supply meals for 3 million vulnerable people.  During the coronavirus lockdown the government insisted that food vouchers for families on free school meals would not be extended outside of term time so he decided to act.

He wrote an open letter to all MPs calling for the decision to be reversed.  The letter drew on his own experiences growing up relying of free school meals and food banks.  He asked that the government make the U turn to protect the lives of the most vulnerable which was not about politics but about humanity.  In June 2020 it was confirmed that he had been successful in his quest and the government changed their mind and extended the scheme through the school holidays.

He has now formed a taskforce with some of the UK’s biggest food brands to continue the work to reduced child food poverty and backed proposals from the National Food Strategy, for an independent review of UK food policy.  Marcus is confident that the group could help change lives for the better and is hoping that with a bigger team of experts he will be able to help more children.

To find out more about Marcus see here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Rashford

To find out more about Black History Month see here https://www.blackhistorymonth.org.uk/

To find out more about World Food Day see here http://www.national-awareness-days.com/world-food-day/

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month, Mental Health

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – September 2020

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Youth Mental Health Day is on 7 September and with that in mind we have chosen Bella Ramsey as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.   Bella is an actress. She made her professional acting debut as the young noblewoman Lyanna Mormont in the series Game of Thrones; she is also known for playing the leading role of Mildred Hubble in the 2017 CBBC television series The Worst Witch and she is currently the voice of Hilda in the Netflix series Hilda.  

Bella started acting as a hobby at the age of four, through Stagecoach Theatre Arts‘ Loughborough branch, which she attended for seven years, she then went to The Television Workshop, where she began auditioning for professional jobs with her first credited role being in Game of Thrones.  

Bella is an Ambassador for the Young Minds Charity, a charity whose aim it is to make sure young people are given the best possible mental health support and the resilience to overcome life’s difficulties.   She became an Ambassador because she is passionate about talking about mental health and destroying the stigma surrounding it and she wants to use the platform she has been given to have to help.  

To find out more about Youth Mental Health Day see here https://www.awarenessdays.com/awareness-days-calendar/youth-mental-health-day-2020/  

To find out more about Young Minds see here https://youngminds.org.uk/  

To find out more about Bella see here http://www.bellaramsey.com/  
Age, Disability, Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month

Inspirational Diversity CHampion of the Month – August 2020

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12 August is International Youth Day and with that in mind we have chosen Dante Marvin as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.  Dante is a Young Ambassador for Variety, the Children’s Charity and Variety North West.

Dante was born with brittle bone disease and scoliosis. He has spent most of his young life in and out of hospital for treatment, including painful rod replacement surgery in his legs.  But refuses to let it get him down. He tells everyone he meets: “There are no disabilities, only abilities.”  It sums up the indomitable spirit of a youngster who inspires everyone he meets with his remarkable zest for life.

Dante first became involved with the children’s charity Variety when his mum Rachel asked for help to buy a new wheelchair. During the home visit, Dante dazzled the assessor with his optimistic outlook and she asked him to speak at an event.

His motto was a key mantra of his speech, which was such a success he now speaks regularly to audiences of adults to raise awareness while encouraging them to dig deep for the cause, helping to raise £30,000 for a Sunshine Bus.

Dante also visits other seriously ill and disabled children in hospital, not only bringing light and laughter to the wards, but also identifying children who could benefit from Variety’s support. He petitions the charity on their behalf for equipment such as lightweight wheelchairs and he’s even been known to do it when undergoing treatment himself.

His message to others is be resilient, be brave and never give up and just because you are disabled, you are no different to anyone else. Never forget that.”

To find out more about Dante see here

https://twitter.com/thedantemarvin?lang=en

To find out more about International Youth Day see here https://www.un.org/en/observances/youth-day

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month, Mental Health

Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month – July 2020

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24 July is Samaritans Awareness Day and this year it is known as The Big Listen, with this in mind we have chosen someone who has openly discussed their mental health situation, the actor and tv personality Denise Welch as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the month.

Denise is an actress and tv personality. She has featured in many well know tv shows including, Soldier Soldier, Waterloo Road, Coronation Street, Eastenders, Benidorm and Dun Breedin to name just a few.  She has appeared in many other tv shows and is a regular panellist on Loose Women.

Her mental health issues began following the birth of her first child.  She refers to the clinical depression she suffers with as ‘The Unwelcome Visitor’ and although she has written before about her struggles her latest book is called ‘The Unwelcome Visitor – Depression and How I survive it’.

This type of book was something she would have found very useful over the last 30 years, within the book Denise reveals her ongoing journey from breakdowns to breakthroughs and through self-destruction to self-acceptance. It lets people know that ‘you’re not alone and you can live a happy and successful life alongside your illness’.

To find out more about Samaritans Awareness day see here

https://www.awarenessdays.com/awareness-days-calendar/24-7-samaritans-awareness-day-the-big-listen-2020/

To find out more about Denise see here

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0919538/