MINUTES: Race, Equality and Diversity Forum – Meeting – 9 December 2014
Rose Bowl 522
Attendees:
Kevin Hylton
Linton Robinson
Killian Ngong
Inder Hunjan
Katrina Tilbrook
Sana Waliyat
Shakiya Nisa
Sarah Grey
Faith Muimo
Sunny Chukwu
Monica Campbell
Harry Singh
James Appleby
Danielle Chavrimootoo
Guillaine Brutus (Student Union)
Apologies
Sunita Morris
Vivienne Caruana
Naeema Hann
Zainah Khan
Tom Fletcher
Susan Waltham
Norma Cannonier
Emily Marshall
Kalist Musinga
Yvette Smalle
Julie Fimusanmi
Bernadette Saltibus
Mumtaz Khan
Yasmin Valli
Minutes of the Previous Meeting
Accepted as a true record.
Matters Arising From the Previous Meeting
Student Union Membership – GB/KH not present to update
Mentoring Scheme – KH referred to the current Leeds Beckett Research Mentoring web
pages and questioned what progress had been made with the scheme expressing concerns
that the Steering Group had not met for some time and that momentum was being lost.
Carnegie’s own mentoring page has also reappeared potentially causing confusion to faculty
colleagues.
KT replied that there had been some issues with the web pages following the name change
update in September resulting in broken links on the university wide web pages. The Leeds
Beckett Research Mentoring page is owned by HR and these had all now been fixed. The
Carnegie website is administered and owned by the Faculty and so any changes to their
webpages would need to be taken up directly with them.
KH queried who would be leading the scheme.
KT said that this should be the Steering Group and that Faculties should be taking ownership
themselves for maintaining the scheme with support from colleagues in HR and a
monitoring role for the Equality and Diversity Team. A meeting for the Faculty Coordinators has been arranged for late January to ensure consistency of approach across the
areas to coordinate more profiles and engage/support staff onto the programme.
KH suggested that the Steering group needs to meet to decide who the established leads
are in order to pass on good practice and then run it through each faculty area.
1
SG reported the group will meet up and coordinate the programme. HR can promote the
scheme and pass the information and feedback of the programme. the going forward the
Research Mentoring scheme is to be supported by the People Development team with
Equality and Diversity’s role to be one of monitoring in relation to gender and ethnicity.
JA questioned whether similar support is available for service staff. SG responded that a
mentoring scheme is currently being developed for support staff (grades 2-4) as part of the
professional pathway and colleagues will be able to access the mentoring soon.
Communication & Promotion – LR distributed a draft email and requested members to
circulate the email after discussion on any amendments to be made. LR idea is to hand out
cards/leaflets and self-promotion via members networks (forum). LR suggested linking up
with different networks i.e. other universities to communicate the message.
IH suggested it would be a good idea to get members more engaged and to develop links to
widen the forums remit by getting involved with different organisations and sectors.
Sunny Chukwu & Guillaine Brutus will also be added to the contact list to distribute
flyer/cards in their contacts.
KT highlighted the circulation list and those who can’t attend expressed a keen interest to
remain on the list. The forum would need to get more volunteers involved.
IH agrees we should link with other education organisations, Leeds College of Art for
instance were impressed with the Biennial conference and would like to join the forum.
KH questioned how this would benefit the forum? LR suggests the forum could share ideas
but with loose involvement & contribution.
IH suggested applying same principles as other institutions on good practice but primarily
the focus should be to engage more people from our university.
SG agreed: the forum should involve own staff on the programme. KH one suggestion would
be to invite other institutions (Reps) to a particular timed session.
IH believes in order to move forward the forum needs more student engagement on
student webpages, at the moment there is no mention of the forum on the student pages,
and it not easily accessible. KT mentioned they are working more closely with Mike & the
Student Union to make information more visible and to communicate messages better to
the students.
GB agreed the webpages not easy to access but suggested trying to use Blackboard/Google
Calendar to convey & promote information to students.
IH suggested promoting the forum via Staff Development & to review how the message is
delivered on the webpages. SG thought it was a good idea & would see how this can be
controlled on the plasma TVs.
Student Services Recruitment Panel – ZK not present to update
Stuart Hall commemoration – MAK not present to update
University Race Equality Week- BS not present to update
Biennial Lecture Feedback (22nd October 2014): KH, VC, LW, IH
2
This was a fantastic evening; great promotion and turnout and overall a highly successful
event. Speakers were well received and the event generated a lot of interest as well as
recruiting new members into the forum. Leeds Beckett Ambassadors kept the evening
running and a huge thanks to their help.
KT: looking forward the members need to discuss how to develop an annual programme &
event.
LR: One of the speakers had requested she does not want to appear on the video. This will
require 1 half hours of footage to be re-edited. In future this will need to be highlighted
that the event will be filmed and used. There was discussion that the filming of the event
had been very clear and obvious from the start but agreement that the amount of edited
footage required will not affect the overall video as her speaking parts were towards the
end of the panel discussion session.
The footage will be available after editing on the website and pictures of the event are also
available on Google drive. KH suggested that the idea of a Poet in Residence was very
popular (Kadija) and suggest we establish this role institutionally and use her for future
events.
LR: Feedback was so positive from the event, especially since VC was there to endorse the
event, her visible presence had a great impact to the event.
Timed Session: Race Equality Charter Mark
This will be submitted in April 2015.
SAT (Self-Assessment Team) met on 5 Nov, all minutes will be on the Race Charter website.
Once the data is collated the action plan will need to be formulated by Jan 2015 to be
submitted in April.
Key points from the survey (staff & student) total 5ll responses. Not a huge response (staff
10% & student 1%). Future surveys will probably need to make better use of social media
with students rather than relying on their university email addresses. Those who responded
wrote detailed responses and themes from these will help to inform the staff and student
focus groups.
There was discussion at the SAT around who would facilitate these and it had been agreed
that Deborah Gabriel from Bournemouth University and the founder of Black British
Academics would be asked to do this.
Discussions to run the focus groups on 8 & 9 Jan, approx. 8/9 people per group & she will
run 4 sessions. This will need to be communicated to all staff & forum members to take part
too. The focus group will be recorded & the group will be notified of this prior to agreeing.
The focus groups are aimed at BAME staff only and one of these will also be set aside
specifically for CARES staff. Student Union will be running the student focus group (mid Jan
4x sessions).
3
A question was asked as to whether the staff focus groups would include BME agency staff.
KT responded that they would be included as the focus groups are for those who work here
and have experiences to contribute. Sunny: Requested if a flyer could be created to
distribute to these staff. SG: We will contact managers in these areas to raise awareness of
the focus groups.
KT: SAT meets on 10 Dec and data will be available on the website in the first week of Jan
2015. KT told the members that from the data specific patterns had emerged from mixture
of response from all background (ie progressions/career). For example, International
Students mentioned sense of belonging which is specific to Leeds. Also the feedback from
BME only 66 out of 511 declared their ethnicity (17 staff of BME) and more women
responded then men.
MC- asked in terms of response how we compared with other universities. KT not sure but
linked into Manchester Met & Bradford University initial responses from our own survey
indicate staff perceptions around career progression & inconsistency in the support which
people felt was available. There is also some suggestion that it was not clear how to access
promotion.
KT: Has created a flyer to promote the focus group. Reassured all members who take part in
the group that anonymity will be key (members from the forum have agreed to take part in
focus group)
There was some concern expressed that the focus group would be recorded however this
would only be for Deborah Gabriel to have access to for the purpose of producing an
anonymous report which is what the University would be given.
SG reminded members the key thing is to formulate an action plan & make a difference
from the data.
Equality and Diversity Update
KT provided a brief update on the use of positive action statements which have just been
introduced for professorial roles as gender and ethnicity are currently under-represented in
these roles. The first adverts to feature these statements were for a number of professorial
posts within the Carnegie faculty.
AOB Not discussed
Date of Next Year’s Meetings
2. Tuesday 24th February 2015 Rose Bowl
3. Tuesday 2nd June 2015 Headingley
Time: 12.30-2pm.
4
Key Actions
Agenda Item
Student Union
Membership
Action: Guillaine Brutus attended the meeting
2nd Biennial Lecture
2014
Action: All Members to discuss as agenda item on how to develop
an annual event & programme
Mentoring Scheme
Action: KT
Liaise with People Development to meet with the Faculty Coordinators to review progress and ensure momentum is
maintained
Race Charter
Action: KT/LW and Forum Members
All Members to: Spread the word about focus groups and generate
interest
KT: distribute flyer for focus group
Communication and
Promotion
Action: NK/LR –
KT to add Sunny & Student Union Rep to email list
KT Find out how to promote the forum to the students via use of
Student Hub/Calendar/ Plasma TVs
Communication
Promotional Flyer
Feedback
Action: ALL Members to discuss how to setup timed sessions for
networks from other institutions (Reps)
Student Services
Recruitment Panel
Diversity
Action: ZK
Stuart Hall
commemoration
Action: MAK will prepare and make a presentation for next
meeting.
University Race
Equality Week
Action BS next meeting
RE&D Web Page Update: http://www.leedsmet.ac.uk/staff/race-network-group.htm
5