1. Current Issues of Equality & Diversity in
Higher Education
David Ruebain
Chief Executive, Equality Challenge Unit

2. Equality Challenge Unit
= Established in 2001 to promote equality for staff in
higher education in the UK
= Remit extended in 2006 to include students
= Funded by the 4 UK higher education funding
Councils, Universities UK and GuildHE
= 19 staff, based in London
= Since August 2011 working with colleges in
Scotland

3. Equality Challenge Unit
ECU works to further and support equality and diversity for
staff and students in higher education and seeks to ensure that
staff and students are not unfairly excluded, marginalised or
disadvantaged because of age, disability, gender identity,
marital or civil partnership status, pregnancy or maternity
status, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, or
through any combination of these characteristics or other
unfair treatment.

4. What we do
• Research and investigation
• Guidance
• Advice line
• Systemic change “beyond compliance”
• Chartermark?
• Networks
• REF, Research, sector specific work
• Equality Link
• Web resources

5. And also
= Biennial Conference
= Best practice
= Regional support
= Intersection with widening participation
(OFFA) – increasingly important with
changes to the sector (fees, core & margin,
student “experience”)

6. 45 years of legislation
= From the Race Relations Act 1965 to the
Equality act 2010 and 9 protected
characteristics
= Direct and indirect discrimination,
victimisation, harassment, reasonable
adjustments
= Equal pay, positive action, procurement
= The Public Sector Duty
= Socioeconomic status?

7. Equality of what?
= Opportunity
= Outcome
= Dignity?

8. Some Challenges in HE
= BME staff
‒ Underrepresentation; marginalisation
= BME students
‒ Differential degree attainment
= Disabled staff/students
‒ Disclosure
‒ Lack of support for staff as compared with students
= Older staff
‒ Abolition of default retirement age

9. Challenges (2)
= Gender
‒ “Leaky pipeline” for women academics
‒ Male students attainment and pastoral support
= Sexual orientation
‒ Harrassment
= Religion and belief
‒ Participation and access
‒ Accommodating religious observance

10. Students – ethnicity
Higher levels of representation nationally
= BME students increased from 14.9%
in 2003/04 to 18.1% in 2009/10.
= Increase in the proportion of BME
students across all sub-categories,
with the percentage of black
students increasing at the fastest
rate, from 4.4% to 5.9%.
However:
= Lower degree attainment than
white peers
= Lower continuation rates than
white peers

11. Ethnicity and type of institution
(Runnymede: 2010, p.7)

12. Student subject choice by ethnicity

13. Student subject choice by ethnicity

14. The degree attainment gap
increased from 17.2% in
2003/04 to a peak of 18.8% in
2005/06 and was 18.6% in
2009/10.
The attainment gap is highest
between white and black
students, where the difference
was 29.8% in 2009/10.
Source: ECU publication ‘Equality in higher education: Statistical report 2011.’

15. Students – disability
Of those students for whom
disability information was
available, the proportion known to
have a disability increased from
5.5% in 2003/04 to 7.6% in
2009/10.
= First degree undergraduate qualifiers known to have a disability were less
likely to obtain a first class honours or upper second class honours degree
(59.9%) than those not known to have a disability (63.4%).
= Of those declaring a disability, students who were in receipt of DSA were
more likely to obtain a first class honours or upper second class honours
degree (60.2%) than students who did not receive DSA.

16. Students – Gender
= Over the past 7 years, there has
been consistently more female
students than male students in
higher education.
= Male students are more likely to
attain a lower 2nd or 3rd class
honours.
= Male students are more likely to
withdraw from course.
= 52.4% of post-graduate student
studying SET subjects are male.

17. Staff - Race
The proportion of UK
national, BME academics is
slowly increasing (5.9% in
2003/04 to 7.0% in 2009/10).
However –
• UK national, BME staff are
more likely to on fixed-term
contracts
• Less likely to be in
professorial roles

18. Staff - Gender
= Overall 19.1% of professors are
women. This is more acute in
SET subjects at 15.1%.
= The mean and median salaries of
female staff are less than for
male staff in almost all
occupation groups.

19. Why do anything?
- Business case – diverse institutions perform better,
particularly in a global, diverse environment
- Legislation - compliance
- E&D is part of core mission of research and teaching
& learning

20. Systemic change work
• Concentrated on under-representation of
women and BME staff in higher education
• Exploring culture change, not just support
for individuals. Not just about “intent”
• May lead to a framework or kite mark
• Building on Athena SWAN principles

21. Building on Athena SWAN
= The culture of your department – self assessment
= Mentoring and career development support
= Career transition points
= Committee membership and development
= Flexible working arrangements
= Transparent workload allocation models
= Core hours of meetings
= Support for those on/returning from parental leave

22. ECU in a complex environment
= Tension between “pushing the agenda” and
supporting compliance
= Differing needs of the sector from mission
groups, regions, types and size of HEIs
= Impact of our work

23. Contact details
David.Ruebain@ecu.ac.uk
7th Floor Queens House
55/56 Lincoln's Inn Fields
London
WC2A 3LJ
Tel: 0207 438 1010
info@ecu.ac.uk
www.ecu.ac.uk