Updated December 1, 2020, Boston Globe
Nneka Nwosu Faison is executive producer of the newsmagazine “Chronicle” on WCVB-TV. Here, she talks about the challenges she faced as a Black TV reporter in New England and the pressure she still feels not to do anything that would make people doubt her. — As told to Katie Johnston
Equality is giving people of different heights the same size box to stand on so they can see over a fence. But the tall person doesn’t need the same size box as a short person. Equity is giving people what they need so that everyone can be at the same level.
My first brush with racism at work happened during my first job after grad school, working for a 24-hour news station in upstate New York. I was covering a mayoral race in a small town and did a story about a candidate who was accused of being a neglectful landlord that aired over and over. He ended up winning the election, and his party was at an Elks Lodge or a Sons of Something, and I went to cover it. I was 25, I think. I was shooting by myself, juggling a camera and a microphone.