The SPADS CDT is committed to facilitating a shift in the culture and diversity of the research community through pro-active practices to support equality, diversity and inclusion.This includes student recruitment team, academic and non-academic staff working with SPADS, through appropriate training. SPADS will ensure all students and staff are respected and valued for their unique perspectives and contributions, and that no-one is treated differently or less favourably on the basis of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, gender or sexual orientation.
Positive actions we are taking include:
Student recruitment
SPADS actively encourages applications from underrepresented groups. We have clear guidelines for student recruitment and all academic staff are encouraged to participate in the recruitment process through interview panels or at the regular consensus meetings when student appointments are made. We ensure diversity on our interview panels to make the selection process fair and transparent for all candidates. We will continuously monitor our marketing materials and website to ensure they showcase successes of students from diverse backgrounds.
Training
We provide Unconscious Bias Training for academics and professional support staff, and a mandatory on-line Diversity in the Workplace training course for all students in the first year of their PhD.
Support
We will promote increased student satisfaction by creating an inclusive, supportive learning environment. We will address the issue of potential isolation that frequently arises from low representation in small cohorts by supporting cross-cohort activities, cross-CDT events and links to the wider PhD student communities within the institutions, which have sufficient mass to overcome this issue. We recognise that ED&I is a matter for all staff and students within SPADS and to ensure that we are able to provide the required level of support, SPADS has a pastoral care team, including the ED&I director Dr. Audrey Repetti and the deputy directors Dr. Yoann Altmann and Dr. Alex Serb. The SPADS is a partnership between University of Edinburgh and Heriot-Watt University and is fully aligned with the ED&I policies of these institutions which can be found at the below links.