Our website wins an award

Great Sampford Primary School has been presented with a Visionary Design Award for going the 'extra mile' in making our website accessible to people with vision impairments.

The Visionary Design Awards are part of an ongoing campaign by National Library for the Blind to encourage organisations to consider the needs of people with vision impairments when designing websites.

Over 100 sites were nominated for the awards this year and from these a short list of 30 sites were chosen as finalists. Our site was short listed in the Public Sector category along with The Environment Agency, the South West Wales Tourism Partnership, two Local/Regional Government offices, a museum organisation and the International Centre for Eye Health.

We received our award from Robert Llewellyn (star of Red Dwarf and Scrapheap Challenge) at a prestigious ceremony at the Russell Square Hotel in London.

Visionary design award

Visionary design award evening

What people have said
Here's what people have said about our winning the award:

Ian Pollard
"We were thrilled to be short listed in the Visionary Design Awards, but to be chosen by the judges as a winner is a tremendous achievement for our school especially when considering the size and resources of the other organisations that were short listed. I am very proud that our ethos of being an inclusive school extends to the web and our site is a demonstration of the overall excellence for which we strive."

Graeme Whippy, ICT governor and creator of the website
"Web accessibility is just a matter of following a few simple rules when designing and building a site. We have proved that you don't need to spend lots of time or money on accessibility, just care and attention. I am hopeful that our success will now inspire others to follow our lead and further improve the accessibility of websites to everyone regardless of their abilities or impairments."

Councillor Stephen Castle, Cabinet Member for Education in Essex County Council
"I am delighted that Great Sampford School has been recognised for going the extra mile in their efforts to increase the accessibility of their website. The award illustrates how important inclusion is within education and I am pleased that an Essex school has set such a high standard for others to follow"

Claire Briscoe, National Library for the Blind
"Great Sampford Primary School has proven that accessible web design is possible, whatever the size of organisation, or resources available. A few thoughtful steps taken whilst designing a website can mean the difference between an inclusive site or one which excludes the 2 million visually impaired people in the UK."

Further information
Read the NLB's official announcement (external site) and the winners in the other categories.