This evening, in a swanky London location, people from all corners of the country’s diverse population will be dressed up in their black tie finest and attending The National Diversity Awards. It’s an annual celebration of the inclusiveness that makes our society so great. Charities, role models and community heroes will be honoured at the ceremony showcasing their outstanding devotion to enhancing equality, diversity and inclusion; thus embracing the excellence of all out citizens irrespective of race, faith, religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, disability and culture.
As it’s such a cheerful award ceremony to hear about, we thought that we’d take a quick look at the less able candidates who have been nominated in the Positive Role Model Award for Disability. We often dislike it when disabled people are labelled as “inspiring”, just for carrying on with their lives and the ubiquity of the word has rightly been criticised by all kinds of people. But in these cases it seems apt. These role models genuinely have inspired people and helped to challenge and change the way people think about disability. Let’s take a whistle-stop look at the candidates.
Adam Pearson, the only male nominee, has neurofibromatosis, a condition that affects one in every 2,300 people and which causes non-cancerous tumours to grow on nerve tissue. He’s had a pretty spectacular year already, after acting alongside Scarlett Johansson in on of the most poignant moments of the critically acclaimed sci-fi film Under The Skin.
His work around raising awareness of Neurofibromatosis has also included him being involved in the Channel 4 documentary Beauty and the Beast: The Ugly Face of Prejudice. He’s become a high profile face for a highly visible, but almost unheard of, condition and does so with humility and humour.
Olley Edwards is a part-time model, actress, film-maker, author, and is also the co-founder of Autism Women Matter. She became involved in campaigning to raise awareness of how autism can look different in females due to the fact that she has two daughters with autism as well as being autistic herself (although this last fact has only recently been found to be true, she was convinced of it for many years!).
She campaigns to raise awareness of women with autism, which is astonishingly often misdiagnosed as depression, OCD or anxiety since autism is for some reason considered a ‘male disease’. She’s written a successful guide book on autism called ‘Why Aren’t Normal People Normal?’ and made a short film on the topic, called ‘The Kindest Label’, which has had over 5 million views on YouTube. She’s brought attention to an important issue and helped people understand the complexities within autism in women.
Chelsey Jay Reynolds lives life by her own personal mantra “not everyone makes a stand, standing”. Just three years ago, she was diagnosed with a rare neurological condition called Postural Tachycardia Syndrome (PoTS), which causes her to pass out whenever she stands up due to her heart rate speeding up so much. Now she spends almost all her time sitting down but she’s certainly not going to sit down and shut up!
She’s joined the wonderful Models of Diversity organisation, where she models and also acts as an ambassador for fellow disabled models. Alongside the organisation she has her sights set on transforming the fashion industry forever to make it more inclusive for all. She’s done fantastic work raising awareness for PoTS as well as showing that being in a wheelchair need be no barrier to a fashionable lifestyle.
Moving from the world of fashion to sport, Susanne Rees, is CEO & Founder of iDID Adventure CIC, a leading provider of inclusive sports opportunities for deaf and disabled individuals. Susanne doesn’t just try and get people in a gym with a basketball, but goes for something more extreme, focusing on sports like rock climbing and wakeboarding. She was diagnosed with Neurofibromatosis Type 2 at the age of 19. This genetic condition has no cure and causes tumours to grow throughout Susanne’s central nervous system, but does not prevent her from her avid rock climbing.
On top of that, she shares her knowledge of starting up a business, with other disabled people to encourage them to emulate her. Life coaching, confidence skills and communications workshops are just some of the additional services on offer to enable personal development. It’s remarkable to lead not just one but two successful businesses whilst dealing with the many obstacles that our society has made for less able people!
Sarah Chapman has been on a remarkable journey from written off tearaway to successful family woman and dyslexia advocate, which has lead her to the National Diversity Awards. After leaving school, in 2000, with no qualifications and undiagnosed dyslexia, she spent nine years travelling and living in near poverty. In 2009 she fell pregnant and this turned her life around. She started taking classes at The Core Centre which lead to an Access course in Teaching at New College Nottingham and onto an Education Studies degree at the University of Derby, where she was eventually diagnosed with dyslexia.
She now dedicates her time and efforts to improving the lives of people with dyslexia through the Dyslexia Association and has organised a workshop at the University of Derby which drew 400 people from across the UK from all sectors of society. She works tirelessly to help people with dyslexia and to better herself too. A wonderful redemption story!
Five worthy candidates from five completely different backgrounds. All deserve to be recognised for their outstanding work to highlight disability and all are truly deserving of being described as inspirations.