Harpers Ferry Center (HFC) of the National Park Service (NPS) produces media found in national parks, such as exhibitions, movies, mobile applications and brochures. Some media is designed in-house, but much is produced in collaboration with contractors. As HFC’s accessibility coordinator, my involvement in projects varies. In some cases I provide brief technical assistance. In other cases, I am more actively involved in the iterative media development process. Because of the work I do, I focus this narrative on exhibit accessibility. The questions posed were fabulous. I could spend far more than the allotted space considering them! They made me think about the approach and outlook I have developed over the years, which crystallized into the below points.

When in doubt and even when not in doubt, multisensory redundancy is good<

At the beginning and throughout the exhibition development process I try to ask:

  • What are the significant message(s) of the whole exhibition and its components?
  • In what multisensory ways can these messages be presented?
  • Is more than one presentation approach necessary to convey the exhibition’s meanings and messages to a diverse audience of users and learners?

Even when I am not a part of an exhibition process, I use these questions to evaluate access. I believe exhibitions that tell the same story in multiple ways have a better chance of being effective (and principles of universal design are often applied purposefully or incidentally). I have learned that it is important to give more weight to the main themes versus small details that are insignificant or ineffective when it comes to more deeply understanding and engaging with the story, such as only making candlesticks tactile to add a multisensory layer to an 18th century story. This is true for individual exhibit components or the exhibition as a whole. For example, the White House Visitor Center exhibition (WHVC) has multiple ways for visitors to engage. You can watch a theater-dedicated movie, hear the voices of former White House workers, watch exhibit videos, touch tactile models and floor plans, look at exhibition panels and read text. Tactile snippets such as swatches of upholstery or an intricate door knob are fun and interesting details, but the tactile models and floorplans are central to the overarching stories and critical for effective communication.

Another example in the WHVC where the above questions helped guide access was the signature touchscreen interactives that surround a large White House model. I consider redundant tactile operation and audio description requirements that needed to be addressed regardless of a lack of technical guidance. When accessibility consultants reviewed the interactive, they noted a heavy focus on the White House virtual tour. Was audio description truly sufficient for someone without sight to gain an understanding of the many rooms and their relationship? The team decided it was not and pullout drawers with tactile floor plans were produced in conjunction with the interactive.

Confirmation from the community is ground truthing

I think the signature disabilities rights movement mantra “Nothing about us without us” is an important reason to include people with disabilities in the design process. We also want to make sure we produce effective products. With a lack of technology and guidance for components like tactile experiences and computer interactives, getting user feedback fills some of this void. Even limited testing can build knowledge. For example, HFC developed a touchscreen interactive at Keweenaw National Historical Park. Visitors who were blind or had low vision would activate the audio description by tapping the top right corner of the screen three times. The president of the local American Council of the Blind chapter visited HFC. We ask her to try the prototyped version of the program. Through simple observation, it was clear our approach to audio description activation would not work. She had to continually, albeit inadvertently, touch the screen to find the top right corner. This may seem obvious now, but at the time it was not. Watching her quickly alerted us to what was likely to be a typical user interface problem. This visit also exposed staff to someone with a visual disability, which I think increases people’s comfort level and helps us make connections with the community (as opposed to just the disability).

Practice builds capacity and fills holes where legal guidance is lacking

I strongly believe legal standards are critical for laying the foundation for access. But legal requirements set minimums and cannot account for all nuances that arise in exhibition development. I also think we have to continually push ourselves to try new things, learn from our failures and successes and make the development process iterative, especially when including user feedback. This ensures better access in current projects that will inevitably be improved upon in future ones. For example, we choose to produce synchronized captions on small monitors for oral histories in the Hangar One exhibition at Tuskegee Airmen National Historical Park. The idea was well received by two NPS accessibility specialists, one of whom was hard of hearing. However, they were concerned with the selected monitor size. When we used this approach for the WHVC, we specified larger screens.

Conclusion

I believe accessible exhibits are dynamic and improve the experiences of all visitors in ways that we can’t always predict. To get us partway there, creating multisensory experiences helps. Seeking feedback from the community can confirm effectiveness. In the process, we also build relationships; increase our comfort level with the community, and; expand our portfolio of best practices to apply to future media and associated accessibility guidelines.

~ Michele Hartley, Harpers Ferry Center-National Park Service

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Discussion

5 comments
  1. Nicole Orphanides says:

    Hello Michele! I appreciate that you called out main themes and that you included the questions you ask at the beginning and throughout the exhibition development process to evaluate accessibility. The questions I have related to the planning process are: Who should be on the team to make these kinds of decisions? In your example of the WHVC, who decided that adding features such as tactile pull out drawers would best complement the audio tour and complete the visitor experience? Thanks!

  2. Michele says:

    Thanks for this comment Nicole! In reading the other case statements, I am struck by the concept that a truly multidisciplinary team is needed—not just during planning, but throughout the life of exhibits. I think these case statements support educators, public relations specialists, and accessibility consultants as critical to the success of the project at some or all of the stages within development and implementation. Having an educator or museum planner who is steeped in UDL seems like a fabulous way of getting at design alternatives that produce multisensory, multimodal experiences. Outreach from PR staff sensitive to cultural issues, yet trained in PR to create an implement a plan for continued outreach would be fabulous. Continual training for staff seems to be a common theme. This does not just include the exhibit team, but front-line staff, such as docents and security.

    To answer you specific question, having the perspectives of accessibility consultants and specialists was invaluable for the WHVC project. It was the accessibility consultants who raised the concern about the touchscreen interactives lacking complimentary tactile experiences. But the design team as a whole, including the specialists, worked on the solution.

  3. Brian Mast says:

    Michele, one thought stuck out to me as I finished reading your case study. Great work by the way. Your statement regarding the need for legal standards to set a foundation for accessibility. While I understand your thoughts in it, my hope is our fellow public historians/interpreters would take it upon themselves to include all audiences in their work. Our profession requires individuals to be passionate and caring about their subject matter. We have this burning desire inside to spread the good word throughout the land with everyone. If you can provide a legitimate argument (in thier minds) on why these audiences should be included in planning and development of museums, historic sites, zoos, science centers…those people, our people will adopt the best practices and lessons set forth by groups like us. A grassroots movement can be more powerful than a top down directive. A caveat though would be if institutions are still not increasing the audience reach no matter what research, numbers or best practices are thrown at them, legal standards can then be examined. This group alone proves a number of people are out there wanting to reach a broader audience to properly fulfill our mission statements/goals. By then we will have more evidence to inform law makers to adopt the lessons learned in the field into law.

  4. Drew Robarge says:

    Your comment about legal standards and small screens resonated with me. When observing one exhibition in our new wing, I found that one of the monitors had text that was rather small and I have fairly good vision. When I pressed someone on it, they said that it met the standards.

    Has there been a case where you or your group made a recommendation and they didn’t comply because it felt like it was too much work or it cost too much or it was unnecessary? How do you deal with that when confronted with that situation?

  5. John Little says:

    I really enjoyed reading about the work you’ve done at Harpers Ferry, and I appreciate the effort you put in to working with the community to test and evaluate exhibits and technologies. I couldn’t agree more: multisensory redundancy is good.

    I have no doubt that it can be a time-consuming process, and I wonder about the schedules that you developed to meet your goals. How long did some of these projects take, and were they able to stay within deadlines and on budget?

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