News

SJA welcomes four new faces to the committee

The SJA is delighted to announce that broadcasters Natalie Pirks, Benny Bonsu and Karthi Gnanasegaram and Jon Holmes, home page editor of Sky Sports Digital, have joined the general committee.

The quartet bring expertise, dynamism and diversity to a committee that has been traditionally print-based. Our Sports Journalism Awards concentrate equally on writing, photography and broadcast categories but this has not always been reflected.

Natalie is BBC’s sports news correspondent and was short-listed at the SJA Journalism Awards in the Broadcast Sports Journalist of the year category.

 

Karthi is a long-time member and supporter of the SJA, both as a judge in the writing awards but also as part of a Question Time to discuss diversity in sports journalism.

She works for the BBC and IMG and also, away from sport, she presents on Classic FM.

Benny, from North London, has just been appointed the first editorial lead of women’s sport on givemesport.com.

She is a TV presenter, one of the first women to cover NBA basketball, and a member of BCOMS, the black sports media collective.

Jon is another long-time member of the SJA.

He is the founder of Sports Media LGBT+ and brings his experience as a digital journalist and sports writer to the table.

Thursday’s AGM at The Swan in Lancaster Gate also agreed to a change of the constitution where the committee was increased from eight to 10, while the three chairs of judges can now have a voting voice.

They will be appointed at the next committee meeting along with co-opted members who bring different skill sets to the table.

It was also agreed to appoint Leon Mann as vice chair. Broadcaster Leon is the founder of BCOMS and the mastermind behind the DWORD conferences on diversity.

He is also a long-time member of the SJA and was co-opted on to the committee two years ago.

The co-chairs’ report for 2018-19 can be read HERE