Yays:

The silent space proved really helpful for lots of people, including those who didn't consider themselves to have access needs. D&D is exhausting and people need a really quiet space to rest.

Blind/partially-sighted participants found the audio beacons useful.

The use of bright yellow for staff t-shirts, floor map and break-out space centre cloths was helpful for partially-sighted participants and others.

The use of unscented soap in the bathroom was appreciated (although we can't take any credit for that!)

The captioning was helpful

The changing place might not have ben used by anyone, but there was feedback that having it there proved to people it was possible to provide such a facility, and that it helped raise awareness of the need for them.

Having designated support staff was helpful.

The pre-event web-page of information was found to be helpful.


Nays:
The nays were mostly requests for things to be tweaked. Some of these we were able to implement between Saturday and Sunday, others we will explore for next time.

Adjust the floor map for partially -sighted people to include an outer ring (we made this adjustment).

BSL interpreters were hard to spot for people who wanted to start a conversation with a Deaf participant. (We adjusted how the meeting place worked and were clearer about when the interpreters would be there).

High contrast paper - ideally yellow paper and black pens. We'll explore this for next year.

Accessible loos being used by participants who didn't have access needs.

The data-capture wall on brown paper was not high enough contrast for partially-sighted people. Next time we'll use white. Some of the terminology around asking about access wasn't right, so that's been edited.

The lists of timetable sessions on the wall were good, but even better would be large-fonts copies for people to take with them, so we did that.

There was a lack of knowledge around etiquette when someone is using a BSL interpreter. People were talking over each other and looking at the interpreter when a Deaf person was talking. We thought it would be good for an interpreter or a Deaf person to call a session about this, or to write a report we could share.

People didn't quite get the hang of describing themselves to the room when making "come and find me" offers. We encouraged people to put these notices on a community noticeboard as well so that the information was saved and could be relayed to participants more easily.

The audio beacons that were helping blind & partially-sighted participants were causing issues for other participants who found the combined noises making it very hard to concentrate. In a perfect world, we'd have bluetooth tech that meant beacons were only audible to the participants who needed them, but this is currently not a financially viable option. Instead we worked with Will Renel who was running the audio beacon to find a compromise around volume and position, and gave tried to make it clear to everyone that they had permission to adapt the space to their needs.


One other note - I'm aware there were people who flagged various needs who didn't end up coming along. Sometimes the access fails are invisible because people didn't even make it into the room because of barriers to inclusion. I really encourage anyone who found they were put off coming because they couldn't find the support from us that they needed, to comment people or contact improbable so that we can work to make sure you feel included and able to come along next time.