SAG-AFTRA, University of California Berkeley Reach Out to Next Generation of Broadcasters

During the spring of 2022, SAG-AFTRA senior staff from the News & Broadcast and Organizing departments partnered with UC Berkeley in a community engagement course titled Collaborative Innovation: The Future of Work for People and the Planet. The course was based on the idea that the complex and intersecting problems of the world must be met with innovative collaborations between multiple disciplines, sectors and communities. The focus of the course is promoting quality jobs and climate justice.

Students Aaron Holmgren, Amaya Bishop, Luke Stiles and Megan Yeh, led by Jasmine Zheng, interviewed SAG-AFTRA broadcast members, management representatives and union staff to take a deeper dive into diversity, equity and inclusion in public broadcast media. Hiring and retaining diverse employees that reflect the community has been a priority for SAG-AFTRA members and a topic during contract negotiations, as shop stewards and leaders have seen a need for newsrooms that are representative of the communities they cover. This is coupled with a high turnover of women and people of color in public media newsrooms across the country. SAG-AFTRA looked to the UC Berkeley students engaged in this course to understand issues around recruitment and retention of diverse candidates and employees in public media.

The UC Berkeley team explored promotion and retention inequities in public media and how newsroom culture, professional development, mentoring and advocacy programs impact the experiences of minority employees.

SAG-AFTRA hopes to continue working with the faculty and staff of UC Berkeley to build a relationship with students.

Photo: From left, students Luke Stiles, Aaron Holmgren, Amaya Bishop and Megan Yeh — with Jasmine Zheng joining via video — at the UC Berkeley Haas Innovation Lab on May 3.

This item originally featured in the SAG-AFTRA magazine summer 2022 issue.