Race Equality Charter award submission update

Following a tremendous effort from those involved, I am pleased to confirm that our Race Equality Charter submission has been completed and has been submitted to Advance HE. We hope to receive a Bronze award, marking the start of this stage of our journey toward greater race equity and inclusion across our institution.

The University has been a member of the Race Equality Charter since 2017 and since then, we have been reviewing data and developing initiatives and solutions to support our submission. We have left no stone unturned as part of the process, undertaking a full evaluation of race equality across the University and working closely with our community to develop a four-year action plan.

Our action plan details the five priorities that we will strive to deliver over the next four years:

• Increase the ethnic diversity of our professional and support staff, with at least a 1.5% increase in the proportion of Black staff and a 1.5% increase in Asian staff within the first three years of the action plan.
• Increase the proportion of B.A.M.E. UK academics overall, and particularly Black UK academics.
• Increase the proportion of B.A.M.E. staff in senior roles.
• Ensure the ethnicity degree awarding gap continues to reduce until the gap is eliminated within the next five years.
• Improve the overall lived experiences for staff and students from minoritized ethnic backgrounds by improving the inclusivity of our culture and encouraging the whole community to better understand race and racism and to be better allies.

To achieve these priorities and to introduce real and lasting change will take work from every single one of us. We are a community, and we can only change if we change together. Creating and maintaining equality and diversity on our campuses is a vital part of our University strategy and is an intrinsic part of where we see our University now and in the future. Racial inequalities can manifest themselves in all facets of life and are not always overt. It is incumbent upon every one of us to champion long term and impactful change to ensure the benefits of our Essex community are open to and enjoyed by everyone equally.

Our submission will now be considered by Advance HE’s Race Equality Charter team and news about our award will come in the next few months. 

Find out more about our commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion on our blogs page.