10: General Information

Dignity at Warwick

We are committed to ensuring a working and learning environment in which all University members (staff and students) are treated fairly and with dignity and respect, and where bullying and harassment are not tolerated.

All staff and students have the right to be treated fairly, a responsibility to encourage a culture of dignity and respect and to challenge inappropriate behaviour. It is expected that we all contribute to ensuring that the University continues to be a safe, welcoming and productive environment, where there is equality of opportunity, fostered in an environment of mutual respect and dignity.

We are all responsible for ensuring that individuals do not suffer any form of harassment or bullying . We encourage the constructive discussion of differences of views and to raise issues with the relevant individuals before they escalate.

The Dignity at Warwick PolicyLink opens in a new window outlines unacceptable behaviours. If you experience an incident(s) of sexual misconduct, bullying, harassment, discrimination, or hate crime, please tell us what happened via secure and confidential online platform called 'Report + SupportLink opens in a new window' . You can report anonymously or speak with an advisor. If you submit a report to speak to an advisor, a specially trained Liaison Officer will contact you within 2 university working days.

Personal Safety and Security on Campus

To feel and stay safe on campus, please familiarise yourself with some guidelines that the Community Safety team have provided for students on the Community SafetyLink opens in a new window website. It offers advice on how to stay safe in your student home on and off campus, and how best to protect your property. You will also find details of who you need to call when in need of help.

Health and Safety

We consider that high standards of health and safety are of paramount importance in enabling us to achieve our objectives. We view compliance with legal requirements as the minimum acceptable health and safety standard. We are committed to planning, reviewing and developing health and safety arrangements in order to achieve a continual improvement in performance.

All staff, students and others working in the Department are expected to adopt a positive attitude to health and safety issues and must comply with appropriate legal requirements and University requirements as laid down in the University's Health and Safety PolicyLink opens in a new window.

The Head of Department, Professor Ben Lockwood, holds the ultimate responsibility for health and safety within the Department, but delegates elements of the maintenance, monitoring, development and implementation of health and safety policy and practices to the Director of Operations, Sarah Duggan, whose roles include that of the Department Health and Safety Officer (DHSO).

You should inform the DHSO of any situation that you consider a real or potential hazard or shortcomings in health and safety arrangements. The situation will be added to our risk register, the risk evaluated, and reasonably practicable measures should be put in place to eliminate or reduce the risk.

We will make suitable arrangements for health and safety within the limits of available financial and physical resources. Any relevant information on health and safety will be communicated to people working in the Department.

Information on fire evacuation procedures, first aid and emergency contact details can be found on laminated notices in all rooms allocated to the Department. You should also familiarise yourself with the evacuation procedure for other buildings on campus where you have lectures and seminars.

The Social Sciences building is open 07:00 – 22:00 every day. These hours apply to all work rooms in Economics and therefore rooms must be vacated outside of these hours. If you would like to continue working after this time, the Library across the road is open 24 hours a day. Please may we remind you, for your wellbeing, it is good to take regular breaks. We would also like to make you aware of the Social Sciences lone working policyLink opens in a new window. We ask you not to leave personal belonging unattended in any of the study rooms at any time.

Student Data

Student Privacy Notice

The University of Warwick is committed to protecting the privacy and security of your personal data. We ask you to read the Student Privacy NoticeLink opens in a new window carefully as it contains important information on who we are, how and why we collect, use and share personal data, your rights in relation to your personal data and on how to contact us and supervisory authorities in the event that you have a query or complaint.

Statement on use of Student Data

The Department of Economics believes that the investigation of student data is integral to the success of our students and the development of the programmes we provide. As a quantitative discipline, the Department values the appropriate, secure, and accurate use of these records to inform internal policies related to the academic success and wellbeing of students.

Engagement with student records forms a central part of the administrative roles held by professional services and academic staff. As always, our goal is to do so in accordance with University’s policies on data sharing and privacy, which fall within the GDPR guidelines.

In addition to these standard uses, we analyse individual-level student data using appropriate statistical methods to better understand the engagement and performance of our students. This research often requires us to combine records from a range of official repositories. For example, we may match demographic information with pre-university student characteristics (e.g., secondary school qualifications) and academic performance to better identify and understand inequalities within our programmes. We also try to measure engagement with educational resources, such as class attendance and usage of online material, to better understand the relationship between effort and attainment.

When doing so, the focus is never on the individual student, but rather the distributions of key variables and correlations between them. This practice of data-usage has helped us target our resources better by first identifying shortfalls in the provision of our programmes. It has also provided important insights into the usage of resources we provide and how this translates into academic success.

We encourage students to participate in data collection exercises. We actively promote participation in the National Student Survey, the results of which play an important strategic role within the Department. We also run internal surveys to measure key variables that are not captured in administrative records; for example, student expectations and well-being.

To better promote the academic success and well-being our students, we need to measure and analyse these outcomes. As a department, we aim to do so in a manner that is transparent and preserves the privacy of all students. We therefore encourage all students to engage with the department in this process and welcome any queries.

Policies and Regulations

The information in this Handbook is as accurate and up to date as we can make it. Changes may be made during the academic year where appropriate. Statements of departmental policy are made in good faith and are an honest attempt to describe current practices, but they do not replace entries in University regulations. In the event of uncertainty the University Calendar and Regulations take precedence.