The National Festival of Youth Theatre has always aimed to be an inclusive event, bringing together a wide range of youth theatre groups, participants and leaders to celebrate their shared passion.

In recent years, we’ve received growing interest from youth groups who support young people that may experience barriers to attending the festival. We have been on hand to help these groups as they plan and fundraise to attend NFYT. We have also been able to make adaptations to the festival to meet different access requirements, including BSL interpreters (ensuring that all our workshops and performances are D/deaf accessible) and accessible facilities at our campsite.

This year we want to put access and inclusion at the heart of our festival. Thanks to support from our funders, we will enable more disabled and disadvantaged youth theatre participants to experience the benefits of attending #NFYT2022. In addition to the support we offer with planning, fundraising or festival adaptations, for 2022 we are also offering a new NFYT Access bursary to help support disability or financial access. Groups can apply for an NFYT Access bursary to reduce participant fees by up to one third, or to help fund any access costs unique to your group. More information is available on the National Festival of Youth Theatre page, or by email from catherine@ytas.org.uk.