Adam Vasco and Graham Downes, School of Education, Faculty of Arts, Professional and Social Studies
Catherine Shillito, Outreach Team, Student Recruitment and Admissions
Subject: Education; Outreach activity
Adam, Graham and Catherine have contributed in an outstanding way to open up opportunities for underrepresented young people to engage and flourish in education. LJMU has a low representation of students from black and multi-heritage backgrounds. Initiating a partnership with a local Secondary School, Archbishop Blanch - which has a high number of pupils from the global majority - projects have involved campus-based learning with academics, technical staff and existing students across the Faculty. The purpose has been to ‘light the way’; increasing wider representation of young people from diverse backgrounds to experience university and recognise that they can and should have a place as part of our learning community. The team’s ‘Everyday Heroes’ project recognises the agency young people bring and is having a measurable impact on aspirations; including the intention to come to university. They act as true partners in their own educational journey.
Liverpool School of Art and Design
Subject: Fashion
The EDI agenda has been at the top of Andrew’s priorities for a number of years. Ever since entering the Fashion Industry and long before he was an academic.
Andrew is a leading commentator on Black Fashion Culture and has continually actively challenged an outdated, unrepresentative and biased industry and education system.
Andrew co-founded FACE (Fashion Academics Creating Equality), which is a progressive and active alliance of Black and Brown members of fashion staff and academics and regarded as a leading EDI thinktank in education practice. FACE and Andrew work with academic institutions supporting practice and curriculum development. Their work has also led to the creation of the Black Excellence Student Prize, open to all Black and Brown students across all UK Fashion programmes.
Within LJMU’s Fashion programmes, Andrew has introduced a number of new curriculum initiatives to ensure greater representation of marginalised voices. Through open discussion, he facilitates current students and alumni to contribute to the creation and development of future EDI material. Alumni are encouraged to maintain contact with the department and return to talk about their experiences as marginalised students through discussion on industry topics.
Sean Mackay and Ebenezer Banahene
School of Nursing and Allied Health
Subject: Nursing
Refugees who qualified as nurses in their home countries are being supported into work in the NHS as part of a pilot programme being run by Liverpool John Moores University, RefuAid, and NHS Trusts across the country. Backed by Ruth May, Chief Nursing Officer for England, the Refugee Support Pilot scheme is a first-of-its-kind collaboration, which supports refugee nurses with the process of becoming registered nurses in the UK and gaining employment commensurate with their skills and experiences. This initiative offers the opportunity, not only to have a career in nursing, but the chance to be included in a community, society and a profession. This offers refugees nurses the tangible chance of a life free of fear, exclusion and marginalisation.
Libby Mitchell, Ellie Glover, Kamran Sheikh, Tori Sprung, Lee Graves, Milly Blundell, Cath Walker, David Tod, Ian Sadler
School of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Faculty of Science
Subject: Sport and Exercise Sciences; EDI
The SPS inclusive curricula team have undertaken an extensive and thorough audit of the curricula across three of the school’s undergraduate programmes and conducted supporting focus groups with key stakeholders (programme staff, student representatives and senior management representatives) to contextualise their findings. As a direct result of this, an EDI enhancement theme has been created to inform the curricula in the school. In early 2022, the school revalidated five undergraduate programmes (including their flagship and largest course, BSc Sport and Exercise Science) all of which embedded EDI into the development of the programmes. Utilising current University programmes and competitors as a point of reference, this practice was deemed innovative and sector leading. This school enhancement theme has empowered programme staff to design more inclusive curricula underpinned by programme and module level learning outcomes related to EDI and thus sustainably embed EDI into the curricula.