Wecan2 > Reports and recommendations

In this section you can find the 2 research reports we wrote, our recommendations, what changes were made and our top tips.

wecan2 research report 1

wecan2 research report 2

In our first research report we asked for

• Big writing and pictures in the meeting papers.
• Time to read the meeting papers before the meeting.
• People to speak more slowly.
• No words that are difficult to understand.
• Lots of breaks so we can have a rest.
• Food and drink to stop us getting hungry and tired.

In our toolkit grid we also asked for

• Participation/support workers to help us understand things.
• Money to pay for transport.

We met with youth service staff and talked about how to do this.

• We used a jargon board to record big words in meetings this get turned into a glossary every 3 months.
  
  
  
  
• We agreed new meeting rules so we could all take part.
• In Blackpool we made a film showing the council how traffic light cards would make meetings easier the council voted to use these.
  
  You can see this here
  
  
  
  
• In Devon they started to use symbols on minutes.
• We met with our support workers before meetings to discuss minutes.
  
  
  
  
• We had food at meetings when we needed it.
  
  
  
  
• The youth service gave us all our travel expenses.
• In Blackpool Allan’s co-chair of the Youth Opportunity Panel became his peer mentor.
  
  
  
  
• In Blackpool the youth service paid for support as part of their commitment to the disability equality duty (DED).
• Our support workers helped us travel if we needed it.
• In Devon Ross applied for a youth opportunity fund grant to pay for support.
  
  
  
  
• Alice applied to the Big Boost lottery fund to pay for her to do research on the UKYP.

After 6 months we collected more evidence to see if our ideas worked

We found that because of ideas and work their was some evidence that young people with a learning disability are

• Understanding more in the meetings than before.
• Really taking part in some of the meetings.
• Speaking out more.
• Being listened to more than before.

However this was not all of the time and work needs to be ongoing to make youth forums and meeting totally inclusive

We hope we have shown that young people with a learning disability or who need extra support like us can take part in Youth Forums and Councils and have their voices heard and that you will support us to be more involved in the future.

See our top tips for involvement here

Wecan2... have a say, take part and be heard!