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| Reaching
Under-represented Audiences |
| by Scott Keir, Copus Officer |
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| Introduction |
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| How can you reach those audiences that are
traditionally excluded from science communication activities?
Funders such as the Copus Grant Schemes are keen to fund projects
that develop new audiences, but what works and what doesn't? |
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| 1.
Background to this document |
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This document summarises the ideas, advice and further work needed
taken from a session at the BIG Event, Herstmonceux, Sussex on 10
June 2003. An open discussion between the attendees was seeded by
three presentations by present or former Copus Grantholders:
- Sue Brumpton, of the Making Place, recipient of a Large Grant
in 2003 for family science activities targeted at local cultural
groups where children and adults work together, exploring science
through simple experiments, leading to making projects to take
away as a permanent reminder.
- Ann Nicol, formerly of the Oxford University Museum of Natural
History and Pitt Rivers Museum, recipient of a Seed Grant in 2001
for Feeling Good, a hands-on temporary exhibition in the museum
targeted at people with disabilities and non-visiting local families.
- Katy Armstrong, Science Education Officer, Sheffield Industrial
Museums Trust (SIMT), who was involved in a National Science Week
2002 grant-funded project 'Star Matters'- A community outreach
initiative’ that aimed to substantially increase family
participation rates in Science Week events from the disadvantaged
and culturally diverse communities bordering Kelham Island Museum.
Unattributed quotes are from the group discussion involving all
attendees or from the presentations. We are grateful for all the
participants for their contributions.
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| 2.
Understand and involve your target audiences |
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To attract, involve and positively engage your target audience
in your project, you really need to know about them. Allow plenty
of time to research who your are looking to attract, how you might
get in contact with them, what stops them from participating now,
when is the best time and what is the best method for them to participate,
and why they should participate now.
For example, analysing the audience surveys of your existing activities
may help identify which audiences are not participating at present,
and tell you something about them by their absence. "From our
audience surveys, we identified two postcode districts that weren’t
coming to our museum, and both had council estates with people at
risk of social exclusion at the centre of them." - Town museum
education staff.
The Office
of National Statistics (Scotland: Scottish
Executive Statistics Service) has figures by broad region of
the population in terms of ethnic origin, income and disability,
which may help you to assess who you might expect to be involved
in your project.
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| 3.
Making contact |
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Finding your target audience may be tricky - you may know that
they exist, but not know how to access them. For many different
types of local audience, local councils may be a good starting point.
Many local councils have staff dedicated to developing links or
skills with particular communities - e.g. community development
workers, disability adult education officers, refugee action housing
officers, refugee education workers, or SureStart
(Multi agency UK-wide Government scheme for families with young
children targeting "disadvantaged areas"). Intermediaries
will most likely be useful to you - e.g. community leaders, representatives,
community nurses or local government staff. In the case of self-declared
community leaders, ensure that they do represent whom they say they
do.
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| 3.1
Ethnic Monorities |
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Most ethnic minority communities are clustered in urban
areas, and many local councils have lists of local community
groups on their website or from their Community office. Sue
Brumpton learned of the existence of many of the groups that
she plans to contact through the list of grant recipients
published by her local council. You may also be able to reach
selected ethnic minority communities through religious groups,
for example one of the participants at the workshop is running
a course in response to a request from a Mosque leader. Local
schools may have learning language tutors, or pre- or after-school
family learning classes which might be able to give you access
to the families of pupils at the schools who have English
as a second language. |
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| 3.2
People at risk of social exclusion |
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Tend to be based in particular local geographic areas,
and may have community associations, or community action groups
that are ready sources of contact. Key individuals in communities
may also help. Locally delivered projects such as SureStart
may also be interested in collaborating on the project.
Local councils may publish or make available to you, contact
details of appropriate local groups. School-related family
clubs may also be an appropriate avenue. Suitable schools
are likely to be those with a high proportion of children
with free school meals.
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| 3.3
Disabled groups |
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Local branches of national disability organisations and
local support groups have been found to be useful in this
regard. Ann "used targeted marketing, which included
asking local disability groups to include notices in their
newsletters - this got groups along." Appropriate local
council staff include those in any disability office, Disability
Learning Coordinators in adult education departments, and
disability liaison staff in the social services department.
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| 4.
Allow time and resources - prepare for the long-term |
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Researching, finding, and engaging these target audiences may take
time and resources, and you may not see more than small improvements
until several months have passed. As one museum education staff
member commented, "We tried contacting these groups through
intermediary projects, and allowed six weeks for this - which simply
wasn’t enough time. We thought these other projects had been
successful in accessing these audiences, and when we tried to use
them, we found they hadn’t been. We are slowly building relationships
with these groups, and we are seeing successes now. And we’re
working with those other projects, so we all benefit."
Acknowledge and accept that having a significant shift in the habits
of your audience will take time, and plan for the staff, financial
and management resources required.
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| 5
Getting the right activity |
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Co-operating with representatives or professional workers of key
groups, running focus groups or piloting activities with small groups
from the target audiences are three ways of helping you tailor your
activity to better suit your target audience.
Some participants found that they needed or they could use an existing
activity to suit the audience. For example, the Making Place and
Oxford University Museum both have existing family-friendly activities
that they know work for all types and configurations of families,
which they can use to attract new audiences. Sheffield Industrial
Museum Trust had an existing exhibition that they wanted to market
better to their local community. As Katy pointed out, "Science
can be a universal subject - there’s less of a cultural barrier
between our local ethnically diverse population and space science
than there is between them and local industrial history, for example.."
For some audiences, new activities may be required, which may be
adaptations of existing work. In OUM, they created a new exhibition
designed to be suitable for disabled people, non-visiting families
(largely low socio-economic status), and refugee groups. They set
up two small discussion groups with the Oxford Council Disabled
Group and a local community association - two round-table meetings
where the groups were led in discussions of what they would like
to see in an exhibition, and what would encourage them to attend.
An alternative form would be to get them to comment on two different
ideas you have for a project. Consider using an external facilitator
for this - running a focus group is a skilful activity, and your
participants may feel more comfortable being open and honest with
someone not connected with your project or organisation. The membership
of the Market Research
Society includes trained facilitators.
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| 6.
Changing attitudes |
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| 6.1
Your colleagues |
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You may need to encourage colleagues within the organisation
to cooperate with your project well as your target audience
if you want the project to succeed. Some participants found
that colleagues, especially in traditional establishments,
were resistant to some audiences participating in the project,
or in implementing procedures that would enable some communities
to participate fully.
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| 6.2
Your audience |
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Part of the process will be encouraging your target audience
to feel that your activity is relevant to them, and for them..
Reasons for their non-participation will be a combination
of several factors, some practical (e.g. physical barriers,
financial constraints), and some attitudinal. Examples of
these attitudinal barriers include:
- Perception of tokenism
- Your audience may be suspicious that you are only wanting
to involve them because you “want to tick some box,
and then you’ll move on to the next group”.
Understanding and consulting your audience will help develop
the trust needed between you and your target audience. “We
need to show that we really are trying to accommodate them
- we really want them to be involved”, commented a
science centre staff member.
- Non-Representation
- If the people working on your project include people representative
of your target audience, this may help build trust. One
science centre staff member pointed out that “Alan
Friedman, director of the New York Science Hall, purposely
recruits floor staff to reflect the local population.”
Community leaders or community mediators may also help.
- Relevance
- Including people from your target audience in the design
process can help them identify what aspects of your proposed
project is already relevant to them, and can help you shape
your project to make it more relevant.
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| 7.
Creating the right environment: the practicalities |
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Creating the right environment can potentially increase your expenditure,
but represents good practice in project design, and could reduce
your cost per visitor. As one exhibition specialist commented, "Designing
for access means that you design for everyone."
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| 7.1
Ethnic minorities |
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For translation and interpretation, assume that it is required
and budget appropriately. In communities where English may
be a second or third language, it may be essential to conduct
the initial approaches and all further communication in the
community’s first language(s).
- Written translation
- Appropriate translation services are available from most
local councils. There are also a number of private companies
offering such services. All will charge - so make sure you
budget for it. You may also find people within your organisation
or sympathetic to your project who are willing to assist.
Sue Brumpton has had some of the posters and displays translated
into some other languages, and each label now has a sign
saying "Can you write this in your language?".
"Many children like to be able to show off their knowledge
of the languages they speak, and it helps give them a sense
of ownership of our centre. Of course, we have to find someone
to double check what they’ve written is accurate!".
- Aural Interpretation
- "Offering interpreters helped us to show we were
serious about wanting to accommodate them. We found they
weren’t needed - the majority of the adults could
understand and speak English, and for those that couldn’t,
another visitor in the group interpreted for them. It’s
better to budget for it and not need it, than to have a
demand we couldn’t fulfil.", advised a science
centre project manager.
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| 7.2
Social exclusion |
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Cost is a big issue, and the strongest message to come
out of the session is that the project should be free at the
point of access for this target audience. Consider supplying
free tickets, vouchers etc., and providing transport and childcare
if your event is targeted at adult audiences (if your organisation
is not used to providing this, professional companies can
provide on-site crèche services). |
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| 7.3
People with disabilities |
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Feeling Good provided a small-scale exhibition, with tactile
objects that could be appreciated by sighted and blind visitors.
The exhibits were on tables at an appropriate height for wheelchair
access, and were placed at the edges of the tables for easy,
consistent access. Labels and scripts in Braille and large
print were provided, and magnifiers and an audio guide were
available for loan. Each exhibit had a Braille label at the
edge of the table. Label texts were long, and designed to
be read out by a friend while a visually impaired person felt
the object. They also provided handling sessions and pottery
workshops to further encourage tactile exploration. The Braille
labels were tried and appreciated by sighted and visually
impaired visitors alike, and the initial paper-based labels
had to be redone in plastic because of the heavy use. Feeling
Good used the Braille printing and the raised line drawing
facilities available in their University, but there are a
number of external transcription agencies who can complete
the work.
For Sign language interpreters, contact the Association
of Sign Language Interpreters of England, Wales and Northern
Ireland (ASLI) or
The Scottish Association of Sign Language Interpreters (SASLI). |
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| 8.
Measuring success |
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Evaluation is the assessment of the success of the project against
the objectives, so it is usually an assessment of the changes that
took place as a result of the project, that wouldn’t have
happened if the project hadn’t happened.
Be aware of the different changes that can take place. These may
include:
- Changes in target audiences: number, length
of visit, engagement with subject, happiness, etc.
- Changes in other groups: professional colleagues,
other organisations learning from you etc.
- Changes in the organisation: new opportunities,
attitudes, funding etc.
- Changes in staff: personal and professional
development
"This was the first time I had led sessions for this audience,
and I found it a really daunting challenge, which was very rewarding.
The support I received from Andrea, the Learning Disability Development
Worker, has given me the confidence to offer sessions for the
group in on a regular basis - an arts-based session in October,
and possibly other themed workshops in later terms."
- Kate Reeve, Oxford Museum, Copus Small Grant holder for Sensing
Science, a week of interactive workshops and gallery tours
imaginatively investigating the science of the five senses, aimed
at adults with special educational needs.
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| 9.
Further information and resources |
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Statutory Government Bodies:
Reports and Guidance:
Please suggest any other resources
you think may be appropriate for inclusion in this list.
Published October 2003. Last updated 23 January 2004.
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