'MY BIG BREAK'

GETTING HER FOOT IN THE DOOR WASN'T EASY FOR THIS TV STAR

- Brigid Auchettl

The first time Narelda Jacobs read the news she was just a child but knew she’d found her passion. “I loved writing, I loved telling stories and journalism just seemed like a natural thing to get into,” Jacobs says, just minutes after coming off-air at Studio 10 where she’s been a panellist since 2020.

Each morning, the eager schoolgirl would excitedly recite that day’s headlines to her classmates. Some 30 years on, she’s still reading the news! “I looked forward to it every day. In fact, I’d want things to happen so I could go and tell the class about it,” she chuckles. “I had no idea decades later I’d be in Sydney at the headquarters of Channel 10 doing heaps of different things on-air and working with people at the top of their game.”

Breaking into the industry was anything but easy for Jacobs, 46, a proud Whadjuk Noongar woman. Initially, she did free work experience to get her foot in the door. Eventually, she landed a job at Network 10 in Perth, where she stayed for almost two decades, before heading to