Woodbridge Tide Mill Museum has been awarded £1,041.50 by the East of England Co-op Community Cares Fund. The Grant will enable the Mill to improve accessibility for visitors with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) to experience the Tide Mill. Before the pandemic the Mill got some 12,000 visitors a year, a number the Mill’s Trustees aim to increase.
Woodbridge Tide Mill Education Officer, Heather Sheehan explained: “The support of the East of England Co-op will help the Mill’s Trustees to allow the widest possible number of people to learn about the Mill, it’s history, what it does and how it does it.
“This generous grant will enable us to do things such as create an accessible website – including access statements and sensory maps. It will also allow us to develop and launch sensory support backpacks – to support young visitors with sensory needs with aids like ear defenders, a magnifying glass, fiddle toys, a museum trail, sunglasses, a torch, a feelings lanyard and a sensory museum map.
“We also intend to use the grant to develop a new themed museum trail, helping to create focus and structure, enabling the experience of the museum to be holistic and much more relaxed for families with SEND children/young people.”
Woodbridge Tide Mill Charitable Trust Chair, John Carrington added: “We simply could not do this at this time without the support of East of England Co-op. This grant will help us to change the lives of many young visitors. It will help them to experience the Mill, it’s history and how bread, the staple of life, was and is made. It will help give them the support they need to learn and enjoy the process.
“The Board of Trustees is determined to make the Mill available to the widest possible audience and is very grateful to the East of England Co-op for its assistance with this Grant.”
