A soupçon Of Disability journalism News
Beth McCowen wrote for The Word late last week disability journalism nonprofit organization Equal Access Public Media soon will rebrand itself in a concerted effort to “better communicate a focus on accessibility in journalism.” Beginning August 1, the company therefore will be known as the Organization for Accessible Journalism.
“Leaders said the change is intended to reduce the time spent explaining the organization’s identity and allow more focus on the accessibility barriers affecting both newsrooms and public-facing journalism products,” McCowen reported on Thursday. “The transition will include a new logo, website, email addresses and branding, alongside the launch of the organization’s new website, accessiblejournalism.org.”
McCowen went on: “The nonprofit, founded in November 2023, provides accessibility training, newsroom guidance and journalism resources focused on disability access and inclusive design. It was created following months of collaboration with an advisory council of disabled journalists. The original name—Equal Access Public Media—was intentionally constructed by the advisory council, word by word.”
Fun fact: I was, for a brief period, part of EAPM’s aforementioned advisory council tasked with conjuring up the founding name in 2023. I didn’t stick around long for myriad personal reasons, but it was, and remains, encouraging to see disabled journalists (like yours truly) stake their claim in the media and remind everyone that accessibility exists and is important and should be covered as such with rigor and vigor. Since bowing out, I’ve kept up with EAPM’s growth and progress on LinkedIn.
“When we go out to give our 30-second elevator pitch, we spend a lot of time explaining what Equal Access Public Media is—the name, not the organization,” Stacy Kess, EAPM’s founder and chief of editorial and accessibility projects, said to McCowen. “We don’t get a lot of time to talk about the great work that we do.”
Kess added: “While our name is changing, our mission is the same. We remain focused on bringing accessibility to the journalism industry and to public-facing news products across the industry.”
The Word is EAPM’s monthly magazine.
In other disability-in-the-press news, this past week I happily discovered there does exist a professional organization dedicated to journalists with disabilities. It’s the Disabled Journalists Association and I’m probably going to be joining very soon. I have a lot of friends in the industry who are part of much more visible groups—the AAJA and NABJ come to mind—but I’ve always felt frustration at the notion there wasn’t anything like them for disabled people like me. It’s certainly heartening to know the DJA exists.
