‘Lived experience’: finally, a disability reporter who has a disability

Level: Advanced

1
  Warmer
Choose the correct answers.

1. ABC is the public news network in America / Australia.

2. The public news broadcaster in the UK is the BBC / NBC.

3. CNN stands for Cable / Canadian News Network.

4. RAI is the national public broadcasting company of Spain / Italy.

5. The world’s first television station was launched in 1928 in the UK / USA.

2
  Key words
Find these key words in the text. The paragraph numbers are given to help you.

1. a noun meaning a limit in society faced by people who have physical or mental differences (para 1)

2. an adjective meaning crying or feeling as if you want to cry (para 1)

3. a noun meaning the ability to understand how someone feels because you can imagine what it is like to be
them (para 1)

4. a noun meaning a reading system for visually impaired people that uses small raised marks that they feel with
their fingers (para 2)

5. an adjective meaning relating to the people who lived in a place for a very long time before other people came to
live there (para 5)

6. a noun meaning the fact that very different people or things exist within a group or place (para 5)

7. a verb meaning watch something to check that it works or happens in the way that it should (para 5)

8. a noun meaning the way you think about something (para 7)

9. a noun meaning the origin of your parents or other older members of your family (para 8)

10. an adjective meaning very obvious (para 9)

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 ‘Lived experience’: finally, a disability reporter who has a disability
Level: Advanced
Nas Campanella says her blindness
brings empathy to the job. The ABC
hopes its diversity push makes the
stories better too
Amanda Meade
2 January, 2021
1 The ABC’s national disability affairs reporter,
Nas Campanella, says the stories she covers
never cease to shock her. “In some ways,
I’m not surprised that certain things are
happening because they happened to me
or people I know, but it never stops shocking
me,” Campanella says. “I’d be lying if I said
it hadn’t made me a little tearful at times but
I think that’s a good thing because it means
I have still got that empathy. You need to be
affected by these things if you’re surrounded
by them constantly.”
2 Campanella is coming up to ten years at
the national broadcaster and has been
a newsreader for seven and a half years.
She was born sighted but, at six months
of age, blood vessels burst in the back of her
eyes, which left her blind. She also has a
muscle condition that means she is unable
to read braille. She uses aural technology
to read. “I was thrilled when I was asked
to do the disability round because having a
person with lived experience in that position
meant there was a level of empathy and
understanding of those issues that hadn’t been
there before,” she says. “Any journalist here
could cover these issues, and do it well, but
obviously there’s a level of understanding and
contacts with the community that I had. I really
wanted to change the way disability issues
are portrayed and I wanted to give people
with a disability the opportunity to tell their
own stories.”
3 Campanella’s role as a television reporter gave
viewers something they had never experienced:
a person with a disability reporting on disability
issues. “I have had an overwhelmingly positive
reaction to being on television,” Campanella
says. “Most people are really excited, most
people are really pleased that someone is
on TV who has eyes that don’t look like
everyone else’s.”
4 After four years of unpaid work, Campanella
says the ABC recruiters saw her simply as
a person with potential. “I think for me that was
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what was great,” she says. “I was seen for
my skills, my experience and my dedication
to the industry.” She says reporting of people
with a disability has been sensationalist: it’s
either a “pity” or “inspiration”, and she wants
to change that.
5 According to the latest available ABC figures,
content makers with a disability make up
4.7% of staff at the ABC, content makers
who are culturally and linguistically diverse
make up 9.4% and indigenous content
makers represent 2.8%. The ABC – and the
media industry more widely – has a long
way to go in representing diversity in all its
forms, in particular ethnic diversity on the
free-to-air TV networks, where presenters
are disproportionately white compared with
the wider population. The ABC news executive
Gavin Fang has the task of making the ABC
news division “look and sound like Australia”
and oversees a number of programmes
to improve diversity.
6 While flagship TV shows are hosted by white
presenters, the diversity of reporters and
presenters on ABC TV is increasing. Recently
ABC News Breakfast changed its hosts and the
journalist Iskhandar Razak, who was born in
Singapore, joined Madeleine Morris as co-host.
Fang says it’s important to nurture talent like
Razak to bring an end to the white domination
of the key presenting roles.
7 Across the ABC, a talent management
project team was formed to look at how the
broadcaster can attract, develop and retain
on-air talent. “We think having more diverse
voices and perspectives in our journalism
makes our stories better and makes them more
relevant to the broadest audience,” Fang said.
“It’s about being more representative. We have
goals around workforce diversity and people
with a disability.”
8 During the Melbourne lockdown in 2020,
audiences became familiar with the young
reporter Elias Clure who was doing live reports
on the ABC news channel. Of African-American
descent, Clure grew up in Australia and
started, like Campanella, as an ABC junior
who wanted to change community attitudes
.“I identify strongly with the ABC’s values
but I also believe strongly its programmes
can be more diverse,” Clure wrote. “My lived
experience can offer a unique perspective.”
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 ‘Lived experience’: finally, a disability reporter who has a disability
Level: Advanced
9 In June, 2020, Clure covered the Black Lives
Matter protests in Melbourne and wrote about
the impact on him and the racism he still
experiences. “Constantly seeing white people
report on issues of race is exhausting,” he
says. “It’s not that white journalists can’t do
a great job – they can – I just don’t think they
can bring as comprehensive an understanding.
It also exposes a glaring lack of diversity in
news coverage in general, although the ABC
is trying to address this with a Diversity Action
Plan for its workforce and content to better
reflect the entire Australian community.”
© Guardian News and Media 2021
First published in The Guardian, 02/01/2021

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 ‘Lived experience’: finally, a disability reporter who has a disability
Level: Advanced

3
  Comprehension check
Answer the questions using the information in the text.

1. How does Nas Campanella read?

2. What gives her a better level of understanding than most reporters?

3. How have people reacted to her being on television?

4. What percentage of content makers at ABC are members of Australia’s indigenous population?

5. When did TV audiences first become familiar with the reporter Elias Clure?

6. What events did Elias Clure cover in June, 2020?

4 Using key language

  
Complete the sentences using these nouns or noun phrases.

talent    TV shows    attitudes    news stories    racism    diversity

1. In many countries, people from minority ethnic backgrounds often experience .

2. People like Nas Campanella are working hard to change .

3. In Australia, the majority of presenters who host are white.

4. Reporters often have to cover in difficult circumstances.

5. Iskhandar Razak and Nas Campanella are examples of the ABC’s programme to represent
.

6. The ABC news executive Gavin Fang believes it is important to develop .

5
  Discussion
Discuss these statements.

• All TV stations should employ a wider diversity of people.

• Reporters should only report on matters they have direct, personal experience of.
• It isn’t important whether a reporter is from an ethnic minority or is someone with a disability.
What is important is that they are a good reporter.

6
  In your own words
Imagine that you have just moved to Australia and you would like to get a job as a reporter with
ABC. Write a letter of application stating your skills and qualifications. Remember that ABC wants
to be more culturally and linguistically diverse, so highlight any aspects of this that you believe
you could contribute.
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 ‘Lived experience’: finally, a disability reporter who has a disability
Level: Advanced – Teacher’s notes

Article summary: The article discusses the Ask students questions to encourage them to use
efforts of the ABC in Australia to become some of the words actively. Questions you could ask
more diverse in its hiring of reporters and include these:
presenters to reflect the diversity in Australian
society as a whole. 2.  Do you ever feel tearful when watching a film?
What kind of films can have this effect on people?
Time: 60 minutes + 3.  What is the difference between sympathy
and empathy?
Skills: Reading, Speaking, Writing 6.  Can you think of examples of diversity in your
school or workplace?
Language focus: Vocabulary
Key:
Materials needed: One copy of the
1. disability
worksheet per student
2. tearful
3. empathy
4. braille
1. Warmer 5. indigenous
6. diversity
This activity can be done individually but works better in 7. oversee
pairs or small groups as it can provide an opportunity for 8. perspective
discussion. Ask students what the national broadcaster is 9. descent
in their country and, if it is an abbreviation like BBC, what 10. glaring
the letters stand for (British Broadcasting Corporation).
Note that CNN stands for Cable News Network. In 3. Comprehension check
question 5, the world’s first television station was WRGB,
which started in New York state in 1928. The BBC began Ask students to complete this activity individually,
broadcasting television programmes in 1932. looking back in the text if necessary. When checking the
answers, you could also ask them to highlight sentences
Key: or phrases that helped them answer each question.
1. Australia
2. BBC Key:
3. Cable 1. She uses aural technology.
4. Italy 2. She is also a person with a disability.
5. USA 3. They have mainly reacted positively.
4. 2.8%
2. Key words 5. during the lockdown in Melbourne in 2020
6. the Black Lives Matter protests in Melbourne
Explain that the context should help students to find
each word and highlight the fact that the paragraph 4. Using key language
numbers are given. Encourage students to compare
answers in pairs or small groups (in break out rooms Encourage students to use the verb + noun collocations
if teaching online) before checking answers with the by asking questions. Question you could ask include:
whole group.
• How can we change people’s attitudes?
Note that the adjective glaring is used in a negative sense, • How could TV companies do more to
e.g. a glaring error, a glaring mistake, a glaring lack. represent diversity?
• Can you think of examples where people
experience racism?
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 ‘Lived experience’: finally, a disability reporter who has a disability
Level: Advanced – Teacher’s notes

Key:
1. racism
2. attitudes
3. TV shows
4. news stories
5. diversity
6. talent

5. Discussion

These questions can also be given as a homework task

so students can think about their responses and make
notes. If done during class time, give students time to
prepare their answers before opening up the discussion.

6. In your own words

The aim of this activity is for students to produce a

letter of application that includes some of the ideas
and language found in the text. Ideally, this should be
done as a homework task. When giving feedback to the
group, highlight any significant errors that are common to
many members of the group and ask students to provide
the corrections.

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