The idea for a nationally-available set of accessibility icons was developed by the Disability Inclusion and Action Group within the Diocese of Derby.
The aim is to improve the information provided by parishes about their accessibility features, so that potential visitors to their services and events can find out in advance whether their access needs are likely to be met. This would help people to plan whether or not they might be able to attend, rather than making the arrangements to come, with all the time and energy cost involved, and only then to find that their wheelchair (for example) cannot fit through the entrance door, or get up the stairs into the worship area.
The Disability Project team have worked closely with the Action Group at Derby to develop the icons, showing accessibility features in a clear way, at-a-glance, when looking a parish’s website or printed information sheets.
Guidance has also been written, for church leaders to understand when they would qualify to add each icon to their welcome pages.
The icon set was launched at Derby Diocesan Synod on 14th June, and parishes within that diocese will be adopting the symbols over the summer. From September these will be made available for all parishes throughout all dioceses to use and implement on their own pages.
Outcomes
Three early-adopter Derby parishes were nominated to try out the scheme, and their feedback was overwhelmingly positive.
"What a wonderful and much overdue tool," said Rachel, Locally Licenced Minister (LLM) at St Peter's in Chellaston. She expressed her thanks to the DIAG for their hard work, and agreed, "It is extremely helpful to have some clear symbols and descriptors for use in church and on our website that enables everyone to make the best of the opportunity to worship Christ fully. Such a blessing.”
Next steps
Over the summer we will be distributing more information about this initiative and how parishes can download and deploy these informative icons. It is such a simple but effective idea. In her book, At The Gates, Naomi Lawson-Jacobs tells a number of stories of disabled people who were disappointed by the facilities available at the churches they turned up to. Those involved said how much it would mean to them, to have full and accurate information in advance:
- Access information in advance could make all the difference to [these people] but they could not often find it on churches’ websites.
- “How do I get there? How far have I got to walk from my car if I’m not going to use my scooter? What’s the distance to the loo?”
- “it’s not about thinking, ‘what does this disability need?’ I think it is purely, ‘What information do we have?’ All that information needs to be available…. So if I walk into a church, I would know that there’s this type of door, that there is a covered bit before we get to the door, there’s a step here. That the books were this size print…. And if you use the hearing aid loop, this is the person you speak to. It would be fabulous.”
In coming years, we hope to make this function available on A Church Near You, so a parish can then easily use simple box-ticking to add accessibility icons to their ACNY pages. This will really help those churches who don’t have a fully-fledged website or web manager of their own, making the scheme available to all.
Carl Veal (centre) presents the Accessibility Icons at the Diocesan Synod launch, with Disability Inclusion and Action Group members Lynda Herbert (left) and the Rt Revd Malcolm Macnaughton, Bishop of Repton (right).
