Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Update

Over the last year, the University has continued its commitment to advancing Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) across the organisation through a number of different activities against Northumbria's EDI themes of 'Embedding EDI into Core Business', 'Taking Action to Eliminate Barriers' and 'Fostering Inclusion and a Sense of Belonging'. These activities have included:

Embed EDI into Core Business:

• All Academic Departments have received their Athena Swan Bronze Award, showcasing their commitment to gender equality. 
• The University was awarded Disability Confident Leader (level 3) status in June 2023, in recognition of the work undertaken to advance Disability Equality. The scheme serves to change attitudes towards disability and to ensure that disabled people have the opportunities to fulfil their potential and realise their aspirations. 
• Nine applications to the VC’s Diversity and Inclusion Fund were successful covering a range of initiatives from ‘Empowered bodies: politics of space through feminist perspectives’ to ‘LGBTQ+ HE Regional Conference’.

Take Action to Eliminate Barriers:

• The University proactively reported on disability and ethnicity pay gap for the first time alongside the statutory requirement for gender pay gap.  
• In November 2022, Northumbria ran a Race Equality Survey, the results will give an understanding of colleague and students experiences and help us address issues on race equality at Northumbria.
• The Workplace Adjustments Passport was launched, designed for colleagues who require reasonable adjustment at work due to a disability, physical health condition, mental health condition or long-term injury.

Fostering Inclusion and a Sense of Belonging: 

• The University commissioned several ‘Race Equality Listening Groups’ in which colleagues and students were invited to help Northumbria identify areas of improvement and ways to change. 
• The ‘Amplifying Inclusion’ seminar series was launched which showcases the research of those in our Northumbria community relating to equity, inclusion, social justice, and activism. The series has provided a new platform for both early careers and leading academics to share their work to new audiences, it has also better provided access to EDI knowledge for students, academics, and professional services colleagues.