In our first meeting of 2021 we discussed our forthcoming submission for the Athena Swan award. We are trying to access all the various data that we need, which will need to be sourced in some cases directly from staff, but mostly our Human Resources department will provide. Meanwhile, lots of equality and diversity activity is happening behind the scenes, both at the school and at the college level. At the college level, the university launched a call last summer 2020 for members to join the College Inclusion Committee. Now that the work of the college committee is under way, we, as equality and diversity committee at the school level, have a more direct and simpler route to escalate any actions that go beyond the school remit.
Key discussion topics centred around our forthcoming coaching scheme in the last phase before the official launch, the results from our latest staff culture survey, and the re-launch of the early career researchers committee. There’s lots more work that should come to fruition in the coming months.