The Natural Resources hub within the Deaf Health Wales Project aims to bridge the gap between natural environments and deaf accessibility through creating accessible information with stakeholders and community engagement. Thanks to the Impact Acceleration Fund at Bangor University, on 21st July 2026, Deaf Health Wales led three outdoor sector events in conjunction with Bannau Brycheiniog Visitor Centre and Argoed Llwyd Outdoor Education Centre.
To maximise impact and reach for the events, the day had two arms. The morning focused on a Deaf Awareness for the Outdoor Sector workshop for outdoor stakeholders and the afternoon focused on British Sign Language (BSL) guided outdoor activities for the Deaf community.
The morning event, held at Bannau Brycheiniog Visitor Centre, invited a diverse range of outdoor sector stakeholders, 19 attendees altogether, including representatives from the National Trust, Urdd, The Outdoor Partnership, RNIB, Mid Wales Sports Partnership and several local outdoor activity providers. The deaf-led workshop was led by members of the Deaf Health Wales Team: Paul Redfern, Andrew Tobin and Libby Steele and was supported by two BSL-English Interpreters. Attendees had the opportunity to learn about how to be more inclusive and accessible for deaf and hard of hearing people within their services and infrastructure. Before and after the workshop, we asked questions to attendees to measure their confidence when communicating with Deaf and hard of hearing people and how confident they feel with including Deaf or hard of hearing people in their sessions. Pre-workshop, 74% of respondents rated their confidence at 1 or 2 out of 5 – where 5 is high confidence levels – and after the session, 78% of respondents rated their confidence 4 or 5 out of 5, demonstrating that the majority of respondents felt more confident to communicate with Deaf or hard of hearing people. When asked about confidence with including a Deaf or hard of hearing person in their session, initially 70% of attendees rated their confidence at 3 or below but after the workshop, 88% of attendees rated their confidence as 4 or above. One attendee’s feedback about the session was:
“I feel like this session was incredibly useful for raising awareness of the barriers deaf/hard of hearing communities may face in participating in the style of events we run, and I feel that I am coming away with a much better understanding and a lot to focus on in regards to how we can improve our provision of these services.”
After a brief interlude for lunch, we kicked off with two BSL Guided Outdoor Activities with Deaf community members. Two activities were offered to attendees, a gentle walk to Twyn y Gaer (Ironage Hillfort) or hike around Craig Cerrig Glesiad and both were led by qualified outdoor instructors supported by BSL-English interpreters. Intended to be smaller group settings, seven people participated in the hike and six people participated in the gentle walk. The weather was glorious and made for great walking conditions; both activities had a balance of active walking/hiking and pauses to discuss the surrounding flora and fauna. All participants enjoyed themselves and learnt something new! From the walk, participants said:
“The walk leader and the national park guide were both knowledgeable about the park and adjusted to the group’s needs – communication, rest stops and time limitation.”
It was really important to the Deaf Health Wales team to make sure that the stakeholder workshop was impactful, beneficial and thought-provoking for attendees with a key focus on building confidence and awareness for when they engage with Deaf or hard of hearing people. For the BSL guided activities, a key focus was to ensure that attendees had a choice of activity depending on their preference and fitness level.
This model of workshops for stakeholders followed by dedicated community events allows the Deaf Health Wales project to create impact and influence for the outdoor sector and create accessible and inclusive opportunities for the Deaf community.
Due to the success and positive feedback from the events, we are now planning to hold the Deaf Awareness for the Outdoor Sector stakeholder workshop in all three national parks and provide more BSL Guided Outdoor Activities across Wales so watch this space!