It has been announced today that the Law School has been awarded a Bronze Athena Swan Award.

Athena Swan is a gender and equality charter mark which aims to promote equality, representation, progression and success for all. It was established in 2005 to help break down barriers to success for female academics in science subjects. In 2015 the charter was expanded to recognise work undertaken in Arts, Humanities, Social Sciences, Business and Law, and to cover professional services roles in Higher Education.

The charter now recognises work undertaken to address gender equality more broadly, and not just barriers to progression that affect women. It also now looks at the careers journey from admission as an undergraduate student, through to – perhaps – ultimately becoming a Professor and shaping the academic experience for the next generation.

Professor Vanessa Munro, who as Head of School at the time, was part of the submission drafting team. She told us, “We are delighted to have secured this award, which is a reflection both of the hard work of the drafting team and of the broader commitment across the school to inclusivity and equality.”

Dr Sharifah Sekalala, Assistant Professor and Race Champion for the School, added “we pride ourselves on teaching and researching law in context that is underpinned by social justice values. It is therefore very important for us to reflect these values in the environment we study and work in, and to commit to ensuring greater inclusivity along the intersectional lines of gender, race, disability, and ethnicity etc.”

By analysing data gathered and benchmarking ourselves against best practice for gender equality in the sector, the School has set ambitious yet achievable targets and developed a robust action plan to enhance the working environment for everyone in our department.

As Sharifah explained: it has “helped us to engage in a listening exercise – both with students and with colleagues - and encouraged us to reflect on how inclusive our offering is for students, as well as how we can best support them – in all their diversity - to progress through and beyond their studies and achieve their full potential.”

Image (from left to right): Jane Bryan, Maria Ovens, Rebecca Limb, Becca Kirk, Sharifah Sekalala and Vanessa Munro.

So what does the future hold?

Vanessa shared, “While we are very pleased and proud to have met the benchmarks for the bronze award, we are not at all complacent and have a number of further initiatives planned. This award is just the beginning of a much longer journey, and we look forward to the next steps.”

We could not have achieved this award without the hard work of the drafting team: Jane Bryan, Becca Kirk, Rebecca Limb, Vanessa Munro, Sharifah Sekalala and Maria Ovens, plus the collaboration and support of colleagues and students across the school.

Congratulations to the team and all who were involved in making this happen.

View a copy of the report.

The School’s Executive Office is now preparing ‘personalised’ action plans (based on information from the overall action plan) for various office holders in the School, for example, Chair of the Equality & Diversity Committee, Head of School, Director of Administration, Executive Office, etc… These will be circulated to office holders by the end of May 2019.