Well done to Jamie Skinner, who has successfully completed his Somer Valley FM six week challenge, overcoming some personal barriers along the way!

Jamie tells us: “I set myself the challenge of arranging an Oscar season for the Midsomer Norton Community Trust – of which I am the film critic. While there were some budgetary constraints and setbacks that prevented this from being a complete season, there were still a number of events that occurred.

“A ‘Could Win, Should Win’ panel event, where I was joined by Ti Singh, the founder of Bristol Bad Film Club, co-host of the Cosmic Shed Podcast and writer of Born To Be Bad, to look at this year’s Oscar nominees. A talk, by myself, on what would win Best Picture, which I managed to successfully predict, and two film screenings (Black Panther and BlacKkKlansman, both nominated for this year’s Best Picture award), with brief introductions beforehand.

“One of the smaller challenges within this wider challenge for me was speaking in front of a crowd. While I am able to present a radio show every week and review films on SomerValley FM, I’m not the best when it comes to public speaking, due to having mild autism.

However, I was able to overcome this anxiety and produce something that I hope was insightful and at times, fairly entertaining and enjoyable!

“The audience that came to these events seemed to enjoy what they came to see. They were fairly informed by what I did and seemed to pay attention and enjoy the events – there were even a couple of laughs every now and then. Even the panellist, Ti Singh, who came along seemed to have a good time and had fun at the event that he was a part of.

“A big thank you obviously goes out to the Midsomer Norton community and the surrounding areas, who came along to these events and supported them. It is genuinely appreciated and means a lot that they came along. I myself also had fun doing these events.

“It was also great to see the interest in film and talking to people afterwards. All this just proved to me that this is what I want to do as a career – film journalism. I genuinely enjoy what I do, and simply talking about films!

“So, yes, I did successfully complete my Six Week Challenge, and I proved to myself a number of things along the way. Despite the setbacks, I manged to pull all of this off – with the help of the Midsomer Norton Community Trust and a number of other people along the way. And hopefully, more film intros will be done for/with the Trust, potentially

alongside some other events, in the near future.

“I personally can’t wait for those to come around!”

To see other Somer Valley FM challenges, or to just learn more about the Six Week Challenge in general, visit: www.somervalleyfm.co.uk/6weekchallenge/