The movement for inclusion

Philip Patston shares his key points from the ‘Arts for All’ workshop about creating an inclusive practice and a welcoming environment for all people, including those who experience disability or unique function.

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In the past two weeks I've had the privilege and pleasure of working with Arts Access Aotearoa and Creative New Zealand, facilitating "Arts for All" workshops in Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin. Despite appalling weather in all three centres, the sessions have been well attended with enthusiastic response.

The aim of the workshops have been to follow the "Arts for All" publication produced last year and were designed to showcase good practice and support arts administrators to create inclusion policies and plans for their organisations.

Here are the key points that I made during the workshops in relation to creating inclusive practice and a welcoming environment for all people, including those who experience disability or unique function, as I prefer to call it:

1. Do it for you, not for "them": Disability or unique function is something that can happen to anyone at anytime. You need to be thinking of inclusiveness in terms of either what you would need in order to access your organisation's services or return to your job, should your physical, cognitive, emotional, visual or auditory function change. This will lead to a more authentic response.
2. Communication is paramount: The most important aspect of accessibility is communication. Tell people how accessible or inaccessible your services or premises are, rather than letting people wonder. Ask people what they need to make things easier, rather then waiting for them to tell you. Survey people before they leave and ask them how you could improve. Engage with people via social networking, rather than relying on traditional marketing and promotion.
3. Start small: Don't get overwhelmed by the scope of accessibility, because it is overwhelming! Choose one thing to do and do it well, then another thing. This will create momentum and have a cumulative effect over time.
4. Be prepared to fail: Creativity expert Sir Ken Robinson says, "You can never have an original idea if you are not prepared to be wrong." Mistakes are part of learning and the creative process. Take risks, stuff up, learn and try again. People will appreciate you making the effort and mistakes make a great platform for dialogue (see 2).
5. Think of it as a movement: Watch/read "Leadership Lessons from Dancing Guy" at www.sivers.org/ff – this is a perfect analogy for creating sustainable inclusion. You don't need to be the only one harping on about access – find your First Followers and you'll be dancing before you know it.
6. Be creative: Remember what sector you belong to and approach access and inclusion with creativity and flair. If any industry should be grabbing the challenge of diversity and inclusion with passion and gusto, it should be the arts.
7. Ask for help: Create alliances with other organisations, contact Arts Access Aotearoa, ask Google or talk to me. This is not new to the world, even if it is new to you. Consider reinventing the wheel by all means (they are only so efficient) but save time by making sure someone else hasn't tried it before, failed and learnt something interesting.

You can visit www.diversitynz.com/aaa/ for a sample policy and action plan template - feel free to use and adapt them to suit your needs.

And Auckland-based organisations have a chance to catch the last workshop at Artstation on 14 June. Contact iona.mcnaughton@artsaccess.org.nz for more information.