Race equality at ARU
ARU is committed to fostering an inclusive culture which promotes equality, values diversity and encourages allyship whilst maintaining a supportive working, learning and social environment for all students and staff.
#ARURaceEquality
What are our commitments to achieving race equality?
We’ve been working to become an actively anti-racist institution over several years, but in June 2020, following the murder of George Floyd and the global surge in the Black Lives Matter movement, our Vice Chancellor, Professor Roderick Watkins, committed ARU to securing racial equality.
A year later, the Vice Chancellor provided an update on our progress and renewed our collective commitment and determination to tackle racism and racial injustice. In it, he reminds us that ARU’s mission has inclusion at its heart and appeals to all members of our community to acknowledge that racism exists on our campuses and in our society, and that we have an absolute responsibility as a university community to identify and reject it in all its forms.
Our Race Equality Strategy, adopted in 2021, sets out a cultural change approach to achieving race equality.
ARU’s Race Equality Strategy
Read our Race Equality Strategy
The Race Equality Strategy embraces an explicitly anti-racist approach to building a university where staff and students can thrive, where they know that they can achieve their goals and see themselves represented in the community.
Building on the foundations of bold leadership, communication, and a deeper understanding of our data, we have identified five workstreams to take forward:
- providing opportunities for learning and conversations about race and anti-racism
- developing more diverse role models and innovative HR initiatives
- shifting the way we build our programmes of study, teaching and assessments
- enhancing and diversifying wellbeing initiatives
- reviewing and improving harassment reporting and complaints processes.
These five workstreams are summarised visually in a Race Equality Strategy diagram.
At ARU we’re proud of our diverse student population and welcome their contributions to the ARU community. We’re committed to working in partnership with our students and our Students' Union to help shape their time at ARU, making it the best it can be.
What initiatives are underway?
The Race Equality Action Plan outlines the key areas of activity and deliverables undertaken by ARU to achieve the aims of the Race Equality Strategy.
The Race Equality Advocates are a team of students employed by the University to lead and deliver anti-racist activities at ARU. Their work evolves every year according to the interests of the students in the team, but the focus is on raising awareness of racism and its impact, running educational activities and events, and supporting curriculum diversification at ARU.
Over the course of the programme, the Advocates have developed diversification guidance and tools to be implemented across faculties, hosted a series of termly events and activities on race and anti-racism and carried out projects in collaboration with staff, alumni and student networks. The Advocates have produced a number of resources like podcasts and blog posts (published on the ARU Student News blog; login required).
“Our Student Advocates continue to play a major role in our work on race equality. This year they have been raising awareness of anti-racism, whiteness, privilege and related themes, and developing tools for the University to diversify curricula.”
The Race Equality Charter (REC) works to improve the representation, progression and success of Black, Asian and minority ethnic staff and students within UK higher education.
The REC process encourages institutions to identify and reflect on structural and cultural barriers standing in the way of Black, Asian and minority ethnic staff and students. We became a member of the REC in 2018.
Member institutions develop initiatives and solutions for action and can apply for either a Bronze or Silver REC award, depending on their level of progress.
In May 2023 we were delighted to be recognised for our work to advance race equality with a Bronze Race Equality Charter award. We're one of 38 UK universities who have achieved Bronze status, while only one has achieved Silver.