Charlotte Chalmers

This special interest group will be headed by Charlotte Chalmers and Christine Pollock (FHLSS), who will liaise with staff and students across the University to further the group aims.  The aims of the group could be summarised as “the support and development of staff involved with teaching, in fostering and maintaining an inclusive ethos in teaching practice.”  We felt it was important to make sure that we did not replicate work already done by other sectors in the University, so our first meeting was with Kev Head (Pastoral Support Advisor, SNMSC) and Anne Ireson (Head of Disability and Inclusion in Student and Academic Services). This article will outline the discussions held at that meeting.

In 2010, the Equality Act replaced the previous anti-discrimination laws with a single Act. The new Act has brought together the three existing equality duties on race, gender and disability and strengthened protection against discrimination in the areas (known as protected characteristics) of sexual orientation, age, religion or belief, pregnancy and maternity and gender reassignment. Under this Act, public bodies are required to give due regard to the need to:

• eliminate unlawful discrimination;
• advance equality of opportunity between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it; and
• foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it.

The University’s Equality Scheme and Action plan 2010-2013, written in anticipation of the new Act, states desired outcomes for the student journey as: “The University can demonstrate equity in the student journey from pre-application to graduation.” 

The involvement of the teaching community is therefore important as a source of evidence of good LTA practice to allow this outcome for all our students, and the Teaching Fellows can act as catalysts for this involvement.

The following are some actions we felt that the SIG could achieve within the next 12 months:

• Produce a summary “who does what” document for teaching staff to clarify the roles of, for example, SDCs and PDTs.
• Liaise with School disability contacts to identify areas of possible overlap/areas in which TFs can be proactive. 
• Develop some “case studies” of good practice in inclusivity (possibly for the LTA Resource Bank, in a named folder).
• In liaison with Academic Development, respond to training needs for staff in developing inclusive LTA practice.
• Interact with students (possibly through the NSA) to identify areas of good LTA practice identify.

tfj october 2011, news, sig inc, inclusivity

Last updated 195 days ago by TFJ