Community Reporter J.R. Bjornson visits AMI Headquarters

Last year, AMI-audio introduced the addition of Community Reporters to our programming. The Community Reporter mission is simple, to report on information, events and happenings in the blind and partially sighted community in their region. Our Community Reporter team helps us create an inclusive broadcast experience for our listeners coast to coast. Over the course of the year this program has expanded to over 20 reporters and now represents Canada from P.E.I. to Victoria and everywhere in between! 

AMI-audio is excited to be hosting several community reporters at our headquarters in Toronto. J.R. Bjornson is a Community Reporter from Red Deer, Alberta. In this blog post he reflects on his experience with AMI.

Over this past week I had the wonderful opportunity to go to Toronto and visit Accessible Media Inc. headquarters. Its been just over a year since I started working for AMI-audio as a Community Reporter, so when I was invited by AMI to visit I said, “yes please” and soon I was on an airplane headed for Toronto. 

On my first day we had a lot to do. We started with a tour of AMI headquarters. When you are walking around AMI’s space you quickly realize this building was made for people with many visual conditions and people with physical disabilities. For someone with limited mobility, the office doors have been equipped with a long rectangle button, that once pushed will open said doors with ease. For people who have light perception or light sensitivity issues, the windows are tinted and some of the lights in the hallways are dimmed. Some walls have tactile feedback so those who use a white cane can feel where they are going instead of having to rely on their cane. The coolest thing of all in my opinion are the tactile hallway markers. At every four-way or three-way hallway crossing there is a tactile button on the floor. You can feel this marker if you’re if using a white cane or with your feet to get a sense of where you are. 

I am a Community Reporter for the Alberta region on the Kelly and Company show and I was given the opportunity to co-host an episode with Kelly and Ramya. There is a lot of work that goes into running a live audio show, more so if the hosts are blind. Both producers and sound technicians do a lot of behind the scenes work to ensure the show runs without a hitch. 

I really loved co-hosting the show because everything we talked about related to me as someone with vision loss in one way or another. I had a chance to learn more about hosts Kelly and Ramya, and yes, they are white cane users. They are the same off air as they are on air. You get the real deal with these guys. I just loved how fun co-hosting the show was, those two hours just went like nothing. So much work goes into every episode, so much so that I can’t fit all of it in a quick blog post.

My time at AMI HQ was amazing because of how accessible everything was, but also because of how awesome AMI is as a company. AMI believes in much of the same ideals I believe in. AMI wants to make a more accessible, inclusive world and to educate people about disabilities and how those disabilities should never get in the way of something like employment. With described video people like me can watch TV with the family. It makes me so happy to be apart of AMI as an AMI-audio Community Reporter.

The number one realization I had during this experience was just how much AMI is truly spreading education regarding accessibility in the world we live in. I always thought the network mainly worked on described video programming, but they are more than just that, AMI is a company that everyone needs to know about. Every business needs to take a page from their book. That is a true statement that I believe in. With that I end my blog post with a big thank you to AMI for bringing my wife and I to their HQ for this eye opening and inspiring experience. 

Check out J.R.'s video blog of his experience at AMI! 

Listen to J.R.’s episode of Kelly and Company. 

Tune in to Kelly and Company weekdays at 2 p.m. ET on AMI-audio.