Delivering Seamless Accessibility at ICED 2025 - How MyClearText Used AccessLOOP to Support a Truly Global Event

The International Congress on the Education of the Deaf (ICED) is one of the most prestigious gatherings in the world of Deaf education. First held in the 1880s and convened every five years, ICED brings together leading researchers, educators, advocates, and community members to share best practices and shape the future of Deaf education. In 2025, ICED returned to Rome, welcoming more than 1,300 in-person delegates from over 50 countries.

Faced with the challenge of delivering seamless accessibility across five days, four stages, and dozens of live sessions, the event organisers turned to MyClearText. The brief was clear: provide high-quality captions that would make the entire event accessible to all audiences, both onsite and online.

To achieve this, MyClearText deployed AccessLOOP, a browser-based live captioning platform capable of delivering both human and AI-generated captions in real time, with support for over 100 destinations. The result was a hybrid captioning solution that provided flexibility, ease of delivery and the kind of quality the ICED audience deserved.

A Complex Brief with Global Reach

The scope of ICED 2025 meant accessibility wasn’t optional, it was essential. With delegates and speakers spanning every continent, the event needed to support high-quality English captioning for all in-room content.

In addition to captioning, a team of Deaf interpreters used the captions to interpret into International Sign and multiple interpreters supported a large BSL audience. The captions served as a reliable backup and were widely appreciated who used them as a primary access tool.

Despite the complexity, the organisers faced a late-stage budget shortfall due to gaps in sponsorship. Originally intending to use human captioners throughout, they found they could no longer afford to do so across all sessions. That’s when MyClearText proposed a hybrid model: human captioners for the plenary sessions and AI captions for breakout and general sessions. It was a cost-effective way to maintain quality for the most visible content, while keeping the entire event accessible.

Petra Csanalosi, Senior Client Manager at MyClearText, said:

“Having a tool like AccessLOOP available meant that we could offer the client a hybrid approach—using a mixture of human and AI-generated captions. It allowed for a seamless transition between the two, with no action required from the client during changeovers. I am confident that with this new approach we will be able to make even more events accessible—providing quality live captions whilst meeting budgets.”

How the Hybrid Setup Worked

Using AccessLOOP, the MyClearText team created four separate projects, one for each stage of the event. Each project was set up to stream captions from Zoom into AccessLOOP, where they could then be outputted to the audience via a simple player. Setup time was fast, about ten minutes per room and once running, the rooms stayed open all day with no latency or performance issues.

Switching between human and AI captions was effortless, with operators able to toggle from one to the other with a single click. Whether transitioning from human to AI or vice versa, captions resumed within seconds and were delivered through the same player. This fluidity allowed MyClearText to ensure uninterrupted service while adjusting to session requirements on the fly.

“The ability to switch seamlessly between human and AI captions is a game-changer,” said Orla Pearson, Co-founder of MyClearText. “There’s no other system that allows you to do this in such a clean, controlled way. Before AccessLOOP, we couldn’t offer this kind of flexibility to clients. Now, we can tailor captioning strategies without compromising on quality, delivery or budget.”

Captioning Team & Workflow

MyClearText coordinated five professional captioners for the plenary sessions, each scheduled in alignment with the ICED programme’s early starts and late finishes. Captioners worked remotely from across three continents, made possible by AccessLOOP’s browser-based delivery model. No hardware or downloads were required, captioners simply logged in and got to work.

AccessLOOP also enabled the team to duplicate project setups, meaning that once the first day was configured, the team could reuse the same structure throughout the week. This saved time, ensured consistency, and made handovers between captioners easy and precise. Those new to the platform noted how intuitive and centralised everything was, while returning users said they were pleased to be using it again.

“What I enjoyed most about using AccessLOOP is that it’s a very professional tool with lots of things you can adjust and change to get captions looking exactly as you want,” Orla added. “But at the same time, it’s really easy to use and reliable.”

Performance on the Day

Across five days of live sessions, AccessLOOP performed flawlessly. No outages. No delays. Just reliable delivery of captions across all rooms, all sessions, and all languages. The project lead at MyClearText was able to monitor all four streams by simply toggling between browser tabs, something that would have been far more cumbersome with traditional setups.

“I’ve run a lot of multi-room events,” said one of the captioning coordinators, “and this was by far the easiest to set up and manage. AccessLOOP made the entire workflow smoother, and I’m looking forward to using it as our default going forward.”

Feedback from the Client

The feedback from the ICED organisers and the AV team was overwhelmingly positive. They appreciated the clarity and support from MyClearText throughout, as well as how little they themselves had to do. Once Zoom was set up each morning, captions just appeared. No troubleshooting. No complexity. Just access.

“We had confidence in the product and in the MyClearText team,” said one of the event leads. “They guided us through what we needed, provided clear explanations and solutions, and delivered exactly what we hoped for. There were no dramas, just a team we could rely on.”

The WhatsApp group used for communication during the event was described as “very happy”, a good sign when coordinating complex live tech.

A Blueprint for Future Events

ICED 2025 was more than a successful delivery, it was a demonstration of what’s possible when accessibility and technology are done right. From setup and captioning strategy to delivery and monitoring, every element came together to support an event that was global, inclusive, and smooth from start to finish.

“This project proved that AccessLOOP can meet the demands of major global events,” said Orla. “It helped us show that accessibility doesn’t have to be stressful. With the right planning and support, it can be easy, efficient and seamless.”

MyClearText continues to support a wide range of clients across the corporate, public, and educational sectors. As demand grows for inclusive and multilingual access to events, AccessLOOP is set to play a central role in making high-quality captioning services more flexible, affordable, and easy to deliver than ever before.

If you're planning a live, virtual or hybrid event and want to explore the best way to deliver live captions, get in touch with the MyClearText team. We’d love to help you make it accessible to all.

Email us at enquiries@mycleartext.com