Introduction
INCLUDE-ID stands for Including people with intellectual disabilities in cultural institutions: supporting participation and enjoyment through digital innovation and artificial intelligence.
INCLUDE-ID repositions people with intellectual disabilities as active cultural agents: participants, co-creators and professionals. For cultural institutions, it offers practical, cost-aware and modular solutions that can be adopted step by step. For policymakers, it provides evidence to make inclusion a core part of cultural policy rather than an optional add-on.
The project contributes to the European Strategy for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the European Accessibility Act.
The challenge
Museums, galleries, historic houses, gardens and heritage sites have made real progress on accessibility over the past twenty years. Yet people with intellectual disabilities are still largely missing from cultural life.
The barriers are many: cognitive, communicative, sensory and motor. Most accessibility solutions are designed for a single, narrowly defined need, such as low vision, and rarely reflect how differently each person with an intellectual disability experiences a visit. Efforts across Europe also remain fragmented and disconnected from cultural policy.
The result is that people with intellectual disabilities are, at best, admitted to cultural spaces. They are seldom invited to shape them.
Approach to transformation
INCLUDE-ID moves the focus from access to participation. The project starts from the individual: their strengths, interests, needs and ways of communicating. It then works with cultural institutions to match what they offer, from spaces and lighting to artworks, texts and staff, with each person's profile.
The project combines three elements:
- Co-design with people with intellectual disabilities, families, educators and cultural professionals at every stage.
- Multisensory practices that open up cultural content through sound, touch, images, 3D objects, virtual and augmented reality, and easy-to-read materials.
- Adaptive digital tools, including artificial intelligence, that personalise the experience in real time and support human guides, teachers and families rather than replacing them.
This work is guided by three principles. Ethics, data protection and fairness are assessed continuously throughout the project.
- Universal Design for Learning
- Person-centred planning
- Responsible research and innovation
Steps for change
- Understand the barriers. Map the challenges and needs of people with intellectual disabilities across European cultural heritage institutions, involving at least 150 participants and 10 institutions.
- Design together. Co-design inclusive cultural experiences with people with intellectual disabilities, families, educators and cultural professionals.
- Develop adaptive tools. Develop and validate AI-based tools that personalise cultural experiences, in an ethical and accessible way.
- Build skills. Train families, cultural professionals and young people with intellectual disabilities to support and lead inclusive cultural participation.
- Test a visitor pathway for children and adolescents with intellectual disabilities, together with schools and families.
- Test a mediator pathway that enables young adults with intellectual disabilities to work as cultural guides.
- Change policy and practice. Produce policy recommendations, good practices and public events that challenge stigma and support uptake across Europe.
Reusable building blocks and results
Everything INCLUDE-ID builds is meant to be reused by other cultural institutions. Software is released as open source; reports and toolkits are published as public deliverables.
- A framework and matrix linking the needs of people with intellectual disabilities to the readiness of cultural institutions
- Co-designed guidelines for accessible and inclusive cultural interfaces
- An open platform for personalised cultural experiences, with software released as open source
- A training toolkit for museum professionals, families and cultural mediators with intellectual disabilities
- Tested and evaluated models for inclusive visits and inclusive cultural mediation
- Policy briefs, replication guidelines and an AI for Accessibility Playbook for cultural institutions and policymakers
The project in short
- Full title
- Including people with intellectual disabilities in cultural institutions: supporting participation and enjoyment through digital innovation and artificial intelligence
- Runs from
- 1 September 2026 to 31 August 2030 (48 months)
- EU funding
- €3,398,987
- Grant agreement
- 101288164 on CORDIS (opens in a new tab)
- Programme
- Horizon Europe, Research and Innovation Action (HORIZON-CL2-2025-01-TRANSFO-09)
- Granting authority
- European Research Executive Agency (REA)
- Consortium
- 10 organisations in 7 countries, coordinated by IRCCS Eugenio Medea