Course-level design: Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

By Tony Burke​

Your programme specification should clearly set out the course team’s commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI). Ideally, there should be a statement indicating specifically how the course has been designed to ensure that any barriers to success are recognised, and steps taken to remove them. Remember that the programme specification will be read by prospective students, so they should be able to discern how such matters have been addressed in the design of the course.

It is important to stress that such a statement cannot simply be a standard paragraph written in generic terms. It must relate specifically to your course and must clearly demonstrate how the University’s commitments have been translated into the context of the course. The statement needs to be backed up by evidence, and course teams must therefore be prepared to indicate to validation / revalidation panels specifically how the commitments manifest themselves in the course documentation.  

Where should the statement be located?

The programme specification template does not have a specific section allocated for the EDI statement so it is up to course teams to decide where the most appropriate location is. Many course teams will incorporate EDI commitments in the learning, teaching and assessment methods sections, since this is where the commitments are likely to have most impact. Other teams choose to devote a dedicated section to EDI within ‘Additional Information’.

What should EDI commitments cover?

You should consider how you can provide clear and succinct information on the following issues:

• What do equality, diversity and inclusion actually mean in the context of your course, and how this is reflected in your design and in the teaching, learning and assessment methods used?
• How are the University’s ‘Black Lives Matter’ commitments reflected in the design of your course?
• What specific steps are you taking to eliminate inequalities in the opportunities that students from disadvantaged groups have?
• How has the course team sought to redress disadvantage associated with racism and colonialism? 
• How will the course team ensure that the curriculum is inclusive and accessible?

Resources to support all these issues can be accessed via the page on ‘Removing the barriers to success’. 

Advance HE Guidance

A helpful publication from Advance HE provides advice provides advice on embedding EDI in the curriculum by reference to five themes:

• Curriculum design
• Curriculum delivery
• Assessment and feedback
• Learning resources, sites and environment
• Staff engagement

QAA Guidance

A very helpful guidance document produced by the Quality Assurance Agency. It aims to support court course teams to embed inclusion and accessibility in the curriculum to enhance the student experience. It is intended to promote a shared understanding of inclusive education through four key parts of the academic journey: curriculum design, course content, learning and teaching, and assessment and feedback practices. 

The document can be downloaded here: QAA Creating Inclusive Subject Learning Communities