In August, Inclusion International held its Listen Include Respect Summer School, a series of sessions designed to train members and self-advocates on the Listen Include Respect (LIR) Guidelines and help them build a deeper understanding of what it means in practice.

The goal was to give members a stronger understanding of LIR and how to bring it to life in their own organisations.

What the Summer School Was About

Over four sessions, members explored the core topics that make up the LIR guidlines:

  • Principles
  • Good support
  • Inclusive meetings
  • Good governance

Each session built on the last, helping members connect the theory of LIR to the realities of their day-to-day work.

Tia Nelis asks students a discussion question during LIR Summer School.

Who Took Part

Twenty members joined the sessions, held over four days, representing organisations from Canada, Uganda, Brazil, Argentina, the USA, Colombia, Germany, and Saudi Arabia.

Throughout the sessions, members shared their own experiences with LIR and talked openly about how they are working to include self-advocates within their organisations.

Key Messages

Strong messages came out of the discussions. Three stood out to me:

Inclusion takes time and no organisation is ever finished. You don’t have to be perfect to start.

“No organisation is going to be ready or is going to be the best, even if you want, right away.” — Alejandra Vanessa Pacheco, Ashdown Colombia (Session 2)

The person says what support they need. Don’t guess what someone needs, ask them, and keep asking.

“Good support is defined by the person that needs the support. They’re the one who says what that support looks like for them and what they need.” — Courtney Soto, Keystone Human Services, USA (Session 3)

Leaders still need support. People often assume that once someone becomes a leader, they no longer need help — but that isn’t true.

“A lot of times people think that once you’re a leader, you don’t need support anymore. And, boom, your disability all of a sudden disappears. Which is not true.” — Tia Nelis, Inclusion International and TASH (Session 4)

Together, these messages made one thing clear: inclusion is an ongoing commitment, and it starts with listening to what people actually need.

Listen Include respect summer school has helped to know how members and self-advocate are using the LIR and how they understand it. Many organisations now know why it is important to include self-advocate and with LIR is helping them to do that.

We need this kind of sessions with our members in order to make sure that our member should use and understand LIR this will help to have active self-advocates in our organisation

Tia Nelis welcomes students to the LIR Summer School session.

Feedback From Members

Members responded positively to the summer school, with feedback showing they were happy with the activities.

The sessions helped deepen their understanding of how to include self-advocates in their organisations  a meaningful step forward for LIR across the network.