Disability unconferencing recommendations to 2024 RSECon committee

accommodations.md

Disability unconferencing recommendations to 2024 RSECon committee

Summarising: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OGJZ1_w3PgmdCMILqsGI-cGtjzuqHbWBTpNjDSkOX2c/

What worked well:

Coffee breaks & session timing:

• having well distributed sessions with breaks in-between was very helpful to allow recovery time
• Workshops on the Wednesday broke up the conference

Posters:

• Positioning these next to the queue for coffee was a stroke of genius.
• Gaps between the posters were wide enough not to cause overcrowding

Covid precautions:

• Social-distancing stickers and wearing of masks were generally respected by attendees
• Clear messaging from organisers on this was great

What could be improved: disability accommodations that could be made

Posters:

• Compile abstracts into a PDF programme to distribute beforehand. Could improve accessibility of the posters for those with visual impairments and various forms of neurodiversity. Possibly link to hosted poster PDFs too?
• Advertise periods when poster room is likely to be quiet: possibly 1 hour each day where the room is held for quiet viewing of posters. Maybe just improving the messaging that the posters can be viewed during other sessions too.
• Have a virtual sli.do room for poster questions and make presenters aware of this, facilitating poster questions for those who struggle with face-to-face interaction

Quiet room:

• Improve signage and info on what the quiet room is actually for (i.e., it is a space to go if you need a quiet environment, not a space where you can go to take a video call).
• Some enforcement may be required: can volunteers check in on the room from time to time?

Food

• Ensuring that dietary requirements are clearly labelled and thought of ahead of time, instead of reactive as it was at '23.
• A standard society checklist to go through with the catering provider might prevent the issues encountered at Swansea?

Social events

• Holding the event closer to the accommodation would allow people to leave when they want, as opposed to having to wait for a bus
• Would be good to have informal (self-organised) backups for those not attending main social events
  • Some starting-off points for self-organisation could be provided
  • Covid-safe spaces, e.g. outside
• Background noise can be an issue (Bunkers was particularly challenging for some attendees, BBQ was much better)
• Options for less full-on session:
  • Bar or Alcohol-based social events can be exclusionary to people on religious grounds (e.g. Islamic beliefs), noise, and various forms of neurodiversity.
  • Board games night? Quieter evening social spaces.

Networking:

• More organised support to connect / network: some suggestions included:
  • Opt-in networking sessions where pairs (or groups of up to 4) are assigned and rotate after some time
  • Facilitate discussion in these using a set of seed questions. Particiapants can use these or take their discussions off-piste
  • Include non-work questions as talking about work can be harder for early career folk.
  • Make this session hybrid.
• Accommodations for neurodiverse attendees will also help early-career folks

Hybrid events:

• Could online attendees be better included in discussion?
  • Providing ability to make unconferencing events hybrid too

Lanyards/badges:

• Print name in larger print on both sides: the badges rotate!
• Maybe a shorter lanyard?
• Can help those with difficulty recognising faces (prosopagnosia, known as "face blindness")
• EDI Working Group organised ribbon making, some participants used this to make their invisible disability visible
  • Perhaps we could provide badges (e.g. "I can be sensitive to certain sounds")
  • Can we raise awareness of attendees with disabilities in pre-conference materials?

Code-of-conduct:

• Some concerns raised that the current reporting model has a high barrier to reporting
  • Could there be a nominated member of the committee to bring CoC concerns to?
  • At the beginning of every session; link to CoC as part of the housekeeping.
  • Give examples to moderators of sli.do questions which are unacceptable

Just had the thought that maybe one way to add non work topics to the conversation starter thing would be to also have ribbon making for hobbies and interests. I think this would also help neurodiverse attendees because it gives an easy way to indicate "these are things I want to talk about!" - I know a lot of people struggle with gauging whether or not other people want to hear about the things they like (and also that a lot of people really do want to hear about those things) and it would help break down that social barrier.

Hi Clark @cruxicheiros! The ribbon making was organised by the RSE Soc EDIA working group (in practice, I organised it with financial support from the society!), not the conference organising committee. I put "Autistic" and "#QueerRSE" on my own ribbons, and that encouraged others to adopt those labels as well.

I think I will run the ribbon making again next year as a) I have all the stuff now, and b) it was, as you say, a really nice conversation starter. I think the key is to have examples of what you might put on a ribbon: we did leave it very open, but in practice people really valued the examples.