An Australian broadcasting program fostering inclusion

Australian community radio carves out an important space for voices and topics of discussion that might otherwise be shut out of mainstream media. It relies heavily on volunteers, offering community members an opportunity to gain confidence and experience as they build skills in the community broadcasting sector. Community radio also fosters connection among community members and encourages collaborative storytelling.

This article is the first of a 2-part series, where we explore Australian community radio as a space for inclusion. In part one, we interview Gemma Purves, the Access and Inclusion Project Manager at Audio Ability.

About Audio Ability

Audio Ability is an inclusive community radio program that provides tailored accessible training, mentorships and paid work placement for people with disability. It also supports radio stations that take part in the program to build their inclusive practices and create accessible resources. The program was established in 2021, funded by the Department of Social Services and co-ordinated by the Community Media Training Organisation. It is now funded by the Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing.

The program is based on the development of relationships between mentors and students and getting hands-on experience in community radio stations. The number of students taking part in each course has ranged from 15 to 28. The students are currently based across 4 states – Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia – and meet on Zoom once a week. The mentors also meet on Zoom once a week to get support in their professional development as trainers and leaders at their station and in their community. Since the program started, they have worked with 35 community radio stations across Australia and almost 90 students.

In our interview, Gemma shares some of the highlights and successes of the Audio Ability program and how the sector is changing to provide more opportunity for people with disability.

People with disability in broadcasting

Do you think people with disability have traditionally been excluded from the Australian broadcasting sector?

Yes, very much. Unfortunately, there are a few different reasons for that. It’s not just ignorance or a lack of understanding about disability or accessibility and inclusion. It’s also a fundamental lack of resources to create physically accessible spaces. A lot of community radio stations are based in old buildings, or they pay peppercorn rentals to their local council, so they take what they can get. They’re really limited in the finances and the resources that are available to them, and their main priority is to stay on air. It becomes a bit of a vicious cycle, because you then end up having narrow perspectives on the airways and in those communities. You then also end up excluding sections of the community because they can’t become involved, or there’s barriers to their entrance into the sector.

A changing sector

There has been a significant change in the sector. We now have disability media called Powerd. We’ve always had the Radio Reading stations, but these stations were focused on creating content for people who are low vision or blind. It wasn’t originally about creating spaces for people who were blind to be the creators. That has changed dramatically over the last couple of decades.

The Vision Australia Radio Network does a really good job of being an inclusive space and engaging people who are blind as radio presenters, producers and technologists. But it’s hard, and it takes time, and sometimes you have to really persuade people so that they can understand the benefit of bringing in more people and not excluding entire sections of the community. Diversity shouldn’t just be a catch phrase.

There are so many advantages to having a diverse base at your station, including a broader audience and sponsors you can attract. As well as truly meeting the ethos of community radio, which is about providing opportunities for unrepresented sections of our community who don’t often get a voice in mainstream media and cover local issues from a local perspective.

Mentoring in the program

A key aspect of the program is working closely with a mentor. What are the benefits of this?

The mentors are integral to the program. It can be really difficult for anyone to join a community, but when you have a disability, or you need a bit of extra time or support to understand things or to become part of that community, it can be overwhelming and really off-putting. By having mentors who also have lived experience of disability, it eases the pathway and shows participants what they can achieve. When you start to connect people, small communities develop within a larger community, and more people want to be part of it. And suddenly, there is more than one presenter on the airwaves with a disability.

Creating opportunity

It’s been delightful to see the mentors’ confidence build when coming into these roles. For some, it’s the first paid work they’d ever had. These are talented radio producers and presenters – people who have been in the sector for years and have never been able to get paid work in the sector. We’re really proud that we value their skills, and we pay them accordingly.

We don’t want people staying in the same position forever because that’s not creating opportunity. One of my course coordinators this round is a former mentor and the person who’s delivering the professional development training is a former student. There are also former students who have become mentors. It’s really important to create those pathways and broaden the impact the program has on as many people as possible.

One of the things that I’ve really been surprised by is how supportive everyone is across a very diverse range of disabilities and support needs. It’s a very inclusive space, despite the wide range of ages, backgrounds and lived experience. The camaraderie and the support among the students and mentors are really strong and a lot of friendships have evolved from it.

What participants learn

What aspects of community broadcasting do the participants learn during the program?

We cover almost everything. This is not a course where you’re going to get an in-depth knowledge of all elements of the radio sector. You get a taste, and our hope is that you then move on to do other things and work out what you really like about community radio. Many people think it’s about having to be on the airwaves, but there’s so much more to it than that.

We cover what community radio is, the nuts and bolts behind the scenes stuff and the media law side of it as well. We teach some interview skills, scripting, how to organise interviews and how to do audio editing. We always emphasise we don’t expect people to do all of it. We all learn differently, so we try and accommodate the different learning needs. Ideally at the end of it, people have had enough of a taste of what they like and don’t like. They can then say to the station where they’ve done their studio training with their mentor and been able to hang out for a couple of months ‘this is what I’d really like to be involved with here’.

Engagement in the program

How has engagement in this program grown since it started in 2021?

I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the stations that want to engage with Audio Ability. Some stations have always been very proactive and inclusive, and others have come on board more recently. It’s just incredible what they can achieve in a short space of time.

Some of the stations that we work with are regional, such as 2Dry in Broken Hill and Cooloola Christian Radio in Gympie. Both have done phenomenal work to encourage members of their community with disability to be part of the volunteer base. And they’ve not just brought them in as volunteers; they’ve given them the skills to then become board members or to take on paid roles at those stations.

Those are the success stories that we really like to focus on, because it shows how much people have to give if you just give them a chance. That’s why community radio is so important. It creates safe environments for people to learn the skills at their own pace to try different things in a station.

How the program supports inclusion

Do you have an example of how the program has helped participating stations to be more inclusive?

Some of the stations have created positions on their board and had participants become board members. They can then provide advice about how the station can be more inclusive and create pathways for other people who might want to be part of the station.

Stations like 2Dry and Cooloola Christian Radio were already trying to find ways and they’ve really engaged with the program and found it beneficial. It’s helped them do the training and support people that they might not have had the capacity to do if we weren’t able to pay for mentoring for those students.

Program outcomes

Have any participants gone on to gain other meaningful opportunities to take part in community and creative industries after completing the program?

There’s been lots of outcomes. For example, students becoming mentors, becoming board members, getting paid roles, getting scholarships to go to the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia awards. People have built confidence to go and find jobs in the sector. We have one student who now works at the ABC, and he’s adamant that if we hadn’t helped him build confidence, he never would have applied for that job.

Other people have realised that they don’t need to be part of a station specifically. They can do stuff remotely and get involved with national radio programs like The Wire or All the Best. One Audio Ability participant was from the Blue Mountains. He’s a young lad and he didn’t find his niche at the stations up there. But he stayed involved with the All the Best at FBI Radio and did field recordings of writer’s conferences and things like that. Somebody else built the confidence to move out of home. So the benefits aren’t always specifically in community radio, but they benefit the community as a whole. That’s really important, and it gives people an opportunity to be part of it.

How people can apply

You can register interest as both a mentor and as a student on the Community Media Training Organisation website.

We welcome people with disability who are involved in community radio to register interest as being potential mentors. We pay them for their work and it’s very much a case of if it’s a right fit with stations and mentors and students. In 2025–26, there will be 2 rounds. The first runs from September to December and the second will run from February to May 2026. Expressions of interest are sought from both mentors and students for both rounds.