UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK

Equality and Diversity Network

Notes of the Meeting held on 21 January 2013

Present: Kate Hughes (Chair)

Sandra Beaufoy (Secretary)

Paul Brown, Zoe Evans, Kathryn Fisher, Robert Horton, Kirstin Inskip, Janet Keene, Alastair Kirk, Claire Martin, Kay Martin, Anne Maynard, Abbi Minnikin, Martyn Potts, Anna Preston, Birgit Roder, Jenny Rooney Kennedy, Ewart Short, Julia Taylor, Yulia Timofeeva

Apologies: Lorna Bagworth, Rachael Barnes, Elisabeth Blagrove, Emma Campbell, Georgina Copeland, Mairi-Ann Cullen, Emma Durrant, Rona Freeman, Hannah Harding, Maria Heredia-Fernandez, Christine Jarvis, Wilfred Kendall, Emma King, Clive Letchford, Donna McIntyre, Barbara Merrill, Rachel Moseley, Andrea Pulford, Naila Rabbani, Ayesha Rahman, Shirin Rai, Clive Singleton, Margaret Shewring, Steph Smart, Sue Smith, Ala Szczepura, Ravi Thiara, Dave Watts, Stephen Williams, Christine Wilkie-Stibbs

In Attendance: Tom Such (Widening Participation/Outreach Officer for agenda item 3) and Iain MacKirdy (Director of Health and Safety for agenda item 4)

1.  Notes of last meeting

RESOLVED:

Notes of the meeting of the Equality and Diversity Network held on 9 October 2012 be approved.

2.  Matters Arising

a) Athena Swan

REPORTED: (by the HR Adviser, Equality and Diversity)

Five departments submitted for Athena Swan awards in November 2012 - Chemistry for a Gold award, WMS for a Silver award and WMG, Engineering and Life Sciences, for Bronze awards. The outcome of these submissions will be known in April 2013.

The University intends to submit for an institutional Silver award in April 2013.

3.  Presentation on the work of the Widening Participation Team

RECEIVED: (by T Such)

A presentation on the programmes and projects that the Warwick Widening Participation team are currently involved with. The Access Agreement, listing funding and targets for intake up until 2016/17 was also discussed.

RESOLVED:

That the slides of the presentation and a copy of the Access Agreement be distributed to Network members.

4.  Departmental Disability Contacts and Accessibility of Buildings

RECEIVED: (by I MacKirdy)

(a)  A presentation on emergency evacuation from buildings for disabled people, with a focus on independence.

(b)  Two workshops will be held by the Fire Safety Adviser to instruct departmental disability coordinators on how to follow the emergency evacuation guidance and to discuss related issues.

(c)  Some departments have yet to nominate a Disability Coordinator for their department.

(d)  The Fire Safety Adviser will be coordinating a project to discern accessibility facilities within departments (such as disabled toilets, lifts, ramps, disabled parking spaces etc). The project will rely on departmental volunteers providing the required information and reporting back to the Fire Safety Adviser. The collected information will be posted on the Health and Safety web pages.

RESOLVED:

(i)  The HR Adviser - Equality and Diversity will circulate details of emergency evacuation workshops when the information becomes available.

(ii)  Departments to notify the HR Adviser, Equality and Diversity of their departmental Disability Coordinator as soon as possible.

(iii)  Departments to notify the HR Adviser, Equality and Diversity of volunteers within their department who wish to be actively involved in the coordination of accessibility facilities within their department.

5.  Mental Health Awareness Day

REPORTED: (by HR Adviser, Equality and Diversity)

There will a Mental Health Awareness Day on Wednesday 20 February 2013 and the focus of the event will be on ‘Voices’. The Psychology Society will be arranging a programme of events to take place, and the Mental Health team will be running a “Wellbeing MOT/Check” stand for staff and students in the Students Union atrium. The MIND bus will also be on campus.

Events will be promoted on InSite.

6.  Training

REPORTED: (by HR Adviser, Equality and Diversity)

The Equality and Diversity training given by Laurence Harvey from Actuate continues to receive excellent feedback. Three more training dates have been arranged: Wednesday 13 March 2013, Tuesday 9 April 2013 and Tuesday 11 June 2013. The sessions will be promoted through the Learning and Development Centre and publicised on InSite.

7.  Stonewall

REPORTED: (by HR Adviser, Equality and Diversity)

The University’s submission to the Stonewall Equality Workplace Index, did not achieve a place in the top 100 companies. Colleagues from Stonewall will be visiting the University to provide feedback on the submission and to give tips on how to improve LGBT initiatives.

8.  Diversity Calendar

REPORTED: (by the Internal Communications Manager)

(a)  It is proposed to launch the Diversity Calendar in October 2013 for the next academic year. A competition for photographs for the calendar will be launched for staff and students within the next month. Suggested topics and specifications on size and quality of the photographs will be communicated shortly on InSite.

(by the Disability Coordinator)

(b)  That the Students Union are launching a new society for students with disabilities, called ‘Enable’. The society has organised a programme of talks and events for the week beginning 21 January 2013 for Disability Awareness Week. The programme is publicised on InSite and members were asked to communicate this to staff in departments.

9.  Items for the Equality and Diversity Committee

There were no items to be taken forward to the Equality and Diversity Committee.

10.  Any other business

(a)  Timing of Lectures

Yulia Timofeeva commented that the timing of lectures between 17:00 – 18:00hrs caused issues for staff with children in nursery care as most nurseries closed at 17:30 hrs.

RESOLVED:

This issue to be brought to the attention of the Space Management and Timetabling office to ensure that more flexibility should be available whenever possible for staff with parental responsibilities.

(b)  Reporting of incidents relating to disabled car parking

REPORTED:

Janet Keene reported that at the last meeting of the Disability Interest Group, a member had complained that external contractors either consistently parked their vans or deposited skips in disabled car spaces. Despite complaining to Estates, such incidences still keep occurring. Members also discussed that there is little information available on how and to who such incidents should be reported.

RESOLVED:

The Disability Interest Group Chair to raise this issue with the Estates Office and request that appropriate signage could be posted by disabled car park spaces to give clear information about reporting such misuse.

11.  Date of next meeting

TO REPORT:

The date of the next meeting of the Network will be 2pm on 29 April 2013 in the Council Chamber, University House.

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