Equality, diversity & inclusion

Public Sector Equality Duty

As a public authority the Public Sector Equality Duty requirements of The Equality Act 2010 require us to:

• eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment and victimisation, and other prohibited conduct
• advance equality of opportunity and foster good relationships between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not

The Public Sector Equality Duty covers the following protected characteristics, with regard to eliminating unlawful discrimination in employment:

• age
• disability
• sex
• gender reassignment
• pregnancy and maternity
• race
• religion or belief
• sexual orientation
• marriage and civil partnership

SRUC Gender Action Plan

In August 2016 the Scottish Funding Council launched its plans to address gender imbalance in subjects offered across Scotland’s Colleges and Universities and the gender gap between male and female undergraduates.

To contribute to the sector’s achievement, SRUC has developed a Gender Action Plan to cover the academic years 2017–2021.

The outputs from, and impact of, the plan will be regularly reviewed and the plan updated accordingly. The plan provides greater detail to aims and actions included within the Outcome Agreement and SRUC's gender action plan 2017-2021.

You can also download the Horizon Europe Gender Equality Plan for SRUC.

Policies and commitments

SRUC is committed to equality, set out in our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion policy.

To further support our efforts we have committed to the principles of several equality initiatives:

Athena Swan – a framework which is used across the globe to support and transform gender equality within higher education (HE) and research. You can find more information on the Advance HE website. Our activity in this area is led by our Self Assessment Team (SAT) who are responsible for the development and implementation of our action plan to ensure that we meet the requirements of the framework.

Disability Confident – a scheme which supports us to make the most of the talents disabled people can bring to our workplace. More information can be found on the HM Government website. Our HR and Recruitment Teams lead the activity which ensure that we meet the standards of the scheme which relate to job applicants and existing employees.

Agrespect – an initiative which promotes and supports diversity in the countryside by supporting rural organisations, colleges and businesses to be welcoming places for LGBTQ+ people. You can find out more on the Agrespect website.

Our Rainbow Staff Network is a key part of our support for Agrespect. The network is open to all staff who identify as LGBTQI+ as well as staff who wish to support diversity and inclusion by becoming Network Allies. More information on the network can be requested via rainbow.network@sruc.ac.uk.

SRUC is committed to valuing diversity among our staff and students and operating in an inclusive manner. We can provide documents in an alternative format or in alternative community languages if requested. You can find out more in our accessible documents policy statement.

Public Sector Leadership Summit – SRUC is making progress in our efforts to ensure that staff and students from all communities are welcomed and heard. We are signatories to the Scottish Government led Commitment to Race Equality. For more information you can download our letter of commitment.

Decolonising the catalogue

We are conscious that, as an organisation with a long history, our library, archives and special collections content may contain historical sensitive language related to the discrimination of underrepresented groups, including Black, Asian and Ethnic minorities, women and LGBTQI+ populations.

The publications in our library document a time and place, and they were created in a specific context, serving as a portrayal of the social mindsets and occurrences of their time. They do not mirror the current views of SRUC; our vision is to embed a culture of equality, diversity and inclusion within our organisation and create an environment where everyone can thrive, contribute and succeed.

When we discover unacceptable language in collection descriptions, we update them to remove any language that could harm researchers or that is offensive to the people being described.

Some materials in collections may contain offensive language or imagery. In the interests of historical integrity, we do not remove these images or words from archival materials, but we will provide a note about these contents in the item’s description. Sometimes we retain offensive or harmful terms in collection descriptions for historical accuracy or to document the issues and social context of a specific time and the attitudes and opinions of the people who created the material.

When creating new descriptions and updating old ones, we strive to use terms that communities and individuals use to describe themselves.