In STEM Careers we have considered the importance of this issue and how to address equality and diversity in practice. If you have worked through the previous sections you will have completed an equality and diversity self-assessment. You may also have done a school/college STEM assessment, or the 11 case studies in STEM Moving On may also have given you some inspiration.

These resources, or your own reflections, may give you some idea of an equality and diversity issue that you could research in order to develop the STEM course choice and progression of the learners you work with. What would you like to know? What would you like to change?

Here are some ideas:

• What do you know about the choices and destinations of learners from your school or college? Who is choosing STEM? Why is that the case?
• Do STEM subject teachers have resources to promote equality and diversity? What do they perceive as barriers and possible solutions?
• To what extent do work experience choices reflect equality and diversity where you work? How could this position be positively developed? Read how one school tackled equality and diversity issues in work experience. More details about this can be found in this report, Widening Horizons in STEM Work Experience by Morton and Collins.
• How much do parents and families know about opportunities in STEM? Is there an information need that could be better met?

The National STEM Centre elibrary has a range of examples of practice that may inspire you. These include a series of STEM studies produced by LSIS ( Learning Skills Improvement Service) in areas such as Gender Inclusivity in Engineering,  Gender in Maths , Engaging Girls in Physics and a report entitled Gender Equality in STEM. Find more by searching the elibrary for equality and diversity in the careers materials. Remember that you will need to register in order to download some materials, especialy videos. Why not use the opportunity provided to rate and comment on resources to help other users?

The activity in this section is for you to plan an action research project in a particular setting to promote equality and diversity in choice of STEM subjects and careers. The outcome of the project is up to you; for example, it could be a resource, a lesson plan, a survey or report. A Project Plan template is provided to help you. Once you have completed the Project Plan, it would be great if you could put it into practice!

If you are willing to share your plan and ideas with other guidance and teaching professionals, please either email your plan to guidance dot research at warwick dot ac dot uk and we will upload on the NGRF STEM Careers learning module to share with others, anonymously if you wish or upload it to the STEM Careers:helping students get the message online community forum.

Taking it further...

Are you interested in doing some research of your own? The National Guidance Research Forum has a wealth of information to support you on Research in practice, which aims to:

• Demystify research by providing a basic introduction to research approaches and processes
• Emphasise the benefits of seeing both the perspective of practice and research
• Promote the view that we can learn from font line search as well as from academic research
• Signpost possible references and resources on how to approach research

Add any comments in the box below or on the STEM Careers Helping Students Get The Message online community group on the National STEM Centre website.

Move on to the next section: STEM Careers Delivery Digging deeper