CLG 11/12/13 Notes
Notes of the College Liaison Group meeting,
11 December 2013, College Development Network,
Stirling
Attendance
Baird Marla
Bass, David
Birney, Nancy
Black, Jean
Cairns, Margaret
Gilchrist, Brian
Grant, Susan
Hall, Chris
Inglis, Susan
Lawson, Barbara
Leitch, Helen
Marshall, David
Marshall, Suzanne
Priestley, Fiona
Storey, Caroline
Ayrshire College
Equality Challenge Unit
Glasgow Clyde College
SRUC
Stow College
Motherwell College
North East College
Equality Challenge Unit
Edinburgh College
Equality Challenge Unit
Perth College UHI
Glasgow Clyde College
College Development Network
Fife College
College Development Network
1. Welcome and apologies
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Introductions took place, ECU thanked College Development Network (CDN) for hosting the
meeting.
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Geraldine announced that a valued CLG member Francis McGeachie, of Coatbridge College,
had unexpectedly passed away recently. The group expressed their sadness at this news and
passed condolences to Francis’ family and colleagues at Coatbridge.
ACTION: ECU to send a card of condolence from ECU and CLG to Coatbridge College.
2. Notes of the last meeting
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The draft notes from the meeting held on 10 October meeting were approved by the CLG.
Action - ECU to upload notes to Scottish colleges practitioner network page on ECU website.
4. For information and discussion:
Completed work
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ECU explained that there were some key messages to share with the sector from the student
support services research, which were flagged at the previous CLG. Noted that given the
complexity of the topic, the research was not able to provide the protected characteristic
specific information, but that it had informed the learner journey projects. Nancy Birney
confirmed that the outcomes from the research would still be very useful for colleges and CDN
felt that the work on defining student services within the research was important. A short
publication will be disseminated in early 2014.
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Three college delegates had attended a workshop on unconscious bias delivered by ECU.
Members who had attended agreed there was good potential and interest for further work in
this area, customised for colleges.
Action: ECU to consider a future college event on unconscious bias.
4. ECU briefing paper update
Ongoing work
Priority 1:
Equality in regionalisation; responsibilities opportunities and benefits
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Mainstreaming equality: delivering on outcomes. Noted that expressions of interest for
participating in the first phase must be made by 20 December. Promotional flyers have been
mailed out to all colleges.
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Supporting the outcome agreement process: ECU has recently published guidance for senior
mangers on embedding equality within SFC outcome agreements.
Priority 2: Robust equality evidence
Developing consistent data collection
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Suzanne Marshall (CDN) provided an update after attending the SFC’s Statistical Advisory
Group’s (SAGE) meeting. SAGE’s chair confirmed at this meeting that the recommendations of
the CLG could be submitted, and would be considered for inclusion in 2014/15 FES 2 guidance.
This guidance will be issued to colleges in December 2013; CDN had forwarded
recommendations endorsed by the group but had not received a reply from SAGE at the time
of the CLG meeting.
Action: ECU to seek an update from SFC on equality data and status of updated FES 2 guidance.
Action: SFC to be invited to provide an update on how college principles reported on equality in
their SFC outcome agreements.
Measuring progress on equality
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Practices will be gathered through mainstreaming programme activity and shared
appropriately.
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ECU’s guidance on qualitative equality evidence and impact measures will be issued in early
2014.
Action: ECU to circulate guidance
Priority 3: Supporting colleges to deliver equitable learner journeys
Equitable admissions
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A short-life working group of college admissions leads will be supported by ECU to produce
guidance for the sector. Eight colleges have expressed interest in the project. A further call for
participation will be circulated in early January.
Action: ECU to circulate call for participation. Colleges to contact David Bass if interested in
participating in equitable admissions and recruitment project and short-life working group by 20
January.
Managing reasonable adjustments
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A joint CDN/ECU event on reasonable adjustments is planned for late march. The focus is a
back to basics approach to administering adjustments. Members indicated that lecturers,
along with support staff, would be a key audience to attract.
Train the trainer materials on reasonable adjustments are available on the ECU website. While
initially intended for HEIs, members thought they could be useful for colleges. Further noted
that Edinburgh University have produced materials on reasonable adjustment e.g. 5 key things
academic staff could do.
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ECU train the trainer pack: Anticipating reasonable adjustments: equality and diversity
training pack
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University of Edinburgh materials on implementing reasonable adjustments
Employability
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ECU has met with Education Scotland, SDS and others and is progressing a project examining
differential outcomes in employability and readiness for further study of students with
protected characteristics.
Priority 4: Learning from UK wide HEI work
E&D for academics
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It was agreed after discussion with the CLG that there is a rationale for targeting these
materials for academic /teaching staff. Itt was further agreed that they should underline the
need for academic staff and support staff to work together in supporting students. Members
suggested that factsheets could be disseminated within learning and teaching CPD and staff
learning environments. Members said it would be very helpful if they also received this in hard
copy.
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It was mooted that similar materials, targeting support staff, would be welcome,
acknowledging their existing expertise , emphasising the benefits from teaching and support
staff collaboration highlighting where they could direct their efforts.
Actions:
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Members to advise ECU on the number of hardcopy factsheets required for their college.
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ECU to publish college specific sheets E&D for teaching staff and distribute electronically to
CDN to add to their professional development resources.
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ECU to provide E&D for teaching staff sheets to colleges both electronically and in hard copy.
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ECU to consider developing E&D fact sheets for support staff in colleges.
Individual support on good relations
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At the October CLG three colleges had indicated an interest in participating in this work. The
ECU lead, Clare Pavitt, is open to receiving further notes of interest; this work begins in
February and would involve a tailored discussion with Clare Pavitt in the first instance.
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It was noted in discussion that this project had been omitted from the Opportunities form.
Action: Any member of CLG interested in participating to email Clare Pavitt
Clare.Pavitt@ecu.ac.uk and ECU to add good relations project to opportunities form and recirculate.
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Student mental health
Chris Brill expressed thanks to all members of the CLG who had contributed their feedback
during the development of the survey and their support in sending this out, as initial response
had been positive. The survey is open until the end of January.
Action: ECU to send further email with links to mental health survey in January.
Understanding the interaction of competence standards and reasonable adjustment
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ECU aim to share the core principles gathered from HEIs across subject areas with colleges.
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CLG members discussed potential subject areas specific to colleges that would be suitable for
including in this research. Members highlighted concerns raised in recruiting students, e.g.
with dyslexia for administrative programmes; staff predicted they may require support from
work colleagues in employment. Other subject areas suggested included construction, sport,
childcare and care.
Action: ECU to feedback to Chris Brill CLG members’ suggestions and ideas for college specific
subjects: construction, (child) care, administration and sport.
5. CDN Update
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CDN updated the group on the recent EHRC event on monitoring the performance the Public
Sector Equality Duty. It was noted that it was hard to separate college specific feedback as the
EHRC grouped FE and HE together. Noted individual college feedback would have been more
useful. The EHRC’s framework for assessment was shared with the group so that colleges could
self-assess their own equality outcomes. ECU noted that some form of outcome review would
naturally be built into the mainstreaming project, ‘Delivering on outcomes, which begins in
January.
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CDN also updated the group on practices a number of colleges had shared on providing prayer
rooms in colleges.
Action: ECU to share CDN paper with Clare Pavitt, who leads on religion
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CDN updated on Scottish Trade Union Congress BME mentoring project, which four colleges
have signed up to participate in.
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The CLG discussed the complaints handling policy (CHP) paper. The initial CHP software
development now in use in many colleges had not been scoped to include tracking by equality
characteristics or issue and this had been recognised as a missed opportunity. The first version
also worked with one MIS system. Suzanne Marshall mentioned that there had been a request
for input to inform an update on CHP from CDN. Training was also requested for frontline staff.
Action: ECU to forward email from Colin Buchanan requesting feedback prior to software update
to CLG members as soon as possible.
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Suzanne Marshall reported she had recently delivered a webinar on inclusivity in the
curriculum. This had been developed from examples of good practice from CDN analysis of
colleges’ mainstreaming report.
Action: Suzanne Marshall to circulate link to webinar and collated examples.
6. A.O.B
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ECU confirmed that there will be three large scale equality focused events tied to the
mainstreaming programme that would be open to the sector. These would take the place of a
single conference.
Dates of future meetings: 19 March and 12 June 2014
Meetings will be held at College Development Network, Stirling.