EP 1 - Community Care with Kadon Douglas
“Our persistence to create safe spaces and to demand that they remain that way, that’s such a huge act of rebellion now, it’s an act of resistance for us to do that”
Yazmeen sits down with the Executive Director of BIPOC TV & Film, Kadon Douglas. They discuss community care and share how they keep themselves sustained in their advocacy work.
In this episode, we discuss:
Relationship between belonging and community
BIPOC TV & Film’s priorities in building and sustaining community
Community care and online tools
What is solidarity?
About the Guest:
Kadon Douglas is the inaugural executive director at BIPOC TV & Film and an experienced not-for-profit professional with a specialty focus in community engagement, marketing, and communications. Prior to BIPOC TV & FILM, Kadon was the Marketing and Communications Manager at The Creative School at The Toronto Metropolitan University. There, Kadon implemented new strategies to reposition the faculty as an international leader in creative industry education, developed a faculty wide social media best practices toolkit, and managed the editorial teams for all e-newsletter, digital (web and social) marketing content strategies. She also advised on and led PR and media relations campaigns to boost recruitment and alumni engagement. Kadon is best known for her pivotal role at Women in Film & Television-Toronto as its communications and engagement manager from 2016 to 2020. At WIFT-T, Kadon led all PR and communications and membership growth and retention strategies—resulting in a record increase in membership, donors, event attendees, and program applications.
Kadon also worked for several years in the documentary production field as a production coordinator, researcher, and digital marketing/audience engagement specialist. She is a two-time fellow of the Hot Docs Film Festival: Doc Accelerator (2013) and Shaw Media Diverse Voices (2015); a graduate of the Humber College Media Business Essentials certificate program (2015) and The Chang School at the Toronto Metropolitan University and Corus Entertainment Media Management Accelerator (2017); and is a 2019 Ontario Nonprofit Network RBC Leading the Future fellow. A former workshop facilitator (Settlement.org and Urban Arts) and regular speaker on various industry panels related to gender and racial equity, Kadon is also an active member of the screen-based media community, volunteering her time on various committees and juries. She is the former chair of the Reelworld Film Festival and sits on the board of the Canadian Independent Screen Fund for Black and POC creators (CISF).
Credits
Guest: Kadon Douglas
Host: Yazmeen Kanji
Producer: Nada Fahmy
Editor: Nafeel Ali
Studio: Allan Slaight Radio Institute