Equity, Diversity and Belonging

We were awarded an Athena SWAN bronze award in May 2020, recognising our commitment to gender equality. This is a sub-component of our overarching aims to ensure our department is an inclusive and equitable environment for all.

Our Athena SWAN submission (click here to open the PDF) includes a very detailed Action Plan for our work in this area for the coming years. This work is overseen by our Inclusion Committee. Recent achievements to date include:

• Revised Personal Development Review (PDR) available for all staff
• Revised Mentoring Scheme for all staff
• Development and implementation of a workload model aimed at equitable distribution of teaching and administrative work
• Student-led newsletter and events calendar to celebrate diversity (e.g., film nights, panel discussions, seminars)
• De-colonising the curriculum working group review
• Department-wide implicit bias training for all staff involved in admissions and recruitment panels
• Improving induction processes for new staff and students so all are, and feel, welcome and supported

Following from the recent events in the US where we witnessed the murder of George Floyd, and the subsequent demonstrations worldwide in support of anti-racist movements, we reaffirm our commitment to opposing racism.

Education is key in combatting racism and we want to educate ourselves and

others in respect of eradicating racism wherever it may be found. Our recent Athena SWAN Bronze award will be an important catalyst to this work. Many of our proposed actions will be instrumental in ensuring we identify and eliminate any systemic racial bias in our procedures, which includes a detailed review of our curricula to ensure diverse and equitable representation. We are an academic community that embraces and values people from all backgrounds. We do not tolerate racism in any form. We also unequivocally support the statement made by our University Advocate for Equality and Diversity and Pro VC, Dr. Rebecca Surender when she said:

‘The University reaffirms its unequivocal abhorrence of and opposition to racism against Black and Minority ethnic people and discrimination in all its forms. At the same time, we acknowledge that the University itself is imperfect in the way it addresses these issues. We still have work to do in creating a truly diverse and inclusive community where everyone feels respected and secure, but we are determined in our efforts to achieve this.’

Further information about how the University is addressing racism and championing equality through its Race Equality Action Plan can be found on the Equality and Diversity Unit website and University Anti-racism resources.

For more information about Athena SWAN or equality, diversity and inclusion more broadly please contact Professor Victoria Murphy (victoria.murphy@education.ox.ac.uk) Chair of the Inclusion Committee.

• University of Oxford Equality and Diversity Unit website https://edu.admin.ox.ac.uk/
• Latest University of Oxford Equality and Diversity Newsletter https://edu.admin.ox.ac.uk/news
• People and Organisational Development (POD) https://pod.admin.ox.ac.uk/
• Anti-racism resources https://edu.admin.ox.ac.uk/files/anti-racisminhighereducationresourcespdf
• Disability Advisory Group https://edu.admin.ox.ac.uk/disability-advisory-group
• Department of Education Code of Conduct (SSO required) Department of Education Code of Conduct.docx