Who was involved in your partnership work, and how did everyone become involved?
ED&I Fellows are comprised of DPhil students, researchers and staff from departments across MPLS. Annually, individuals apply to become Fellows and are chosen through a selection process that ensures diversity in departmental representation and individuals’ lived experiences. Each ED&I Fellow receives a £1000 honorarium to support their career or professional development endeavours as a thank you for their time and effort.
What did you set out to achieve in your student-staff partnership work?
Every year, we work with a cohort of ED&I Fellows to determine which initiatives to carry out that support our divisional ED&I action plan and to contribute to ED&I activity in MPLS departments. The Fellowship enables us to understand different perspectives from across the MPLS community when working on ED&I and related areas.
When and where did you work together?
Starting in 2020, we now run an annual Fellowship programme throughout each academic year.
How did you work in partnership?
We meet with our ED&I Fellows at twice-termly, two-hour long Fellows meetings. Here, we consult our Fellows on the actions currently being taken forward as part of the ED&I strategy and have open discussions about what additional initiatives they would like to work on that we (or other Fellows) could support. Often Fellows take responsibility for delivering actions either as individuals or in groups, with support from the divisional ED&I team. These meetings also enable Fellows to bring their own passions and ideas for change alongside their understanding of what would be possible and impactful for them as students and staff. This combination of expertise enables us to work together to evaluate ongoing initiatives and decide on a range of novel and impactful initiatives that the division could support. In this way, the group acts as both a consultative advisory body and a steering committee for divisional level projects. Fellows also sit on and contribute to our twice-termly Steering Group meetings (which includes academic and PSS staff from across the division).
By positioning student and staff ED&I Fellows as equal contributors in the group’s decision-making processes, we take a student-staff partnership approach to steering these initiatives. We facilitate this approach by hosting an induction for all our Fellows, where we give everyone the chance to get to know one another and the wider landscape of work going on, alongside the twice-termly Fellows/ED&I team meetings. In the induction and ongoing meetings, we emphasise how much we value individual contributions and unique perspectives into their lived experiences as members of their department with their own unique identities. We encourage Fellows and departmental academic/PSS leads to work together on department-specific initiatives throughout the year, and Fellows can get as involved in ED&I work as capacity and interest allows.
We host wellbeing sessions throughout the year to ensure that our ED&I Fellows are supported to carry out this work, and ask for feedback throughout the year and at the end of the Fellowship to improve the experience for future cohorts.
What did you learn from working in partnership?
We value our ED&I Fellows enormously. Bringing DPhil students and staff together to steer our ED&I initiatives has led us to develop a range of impactful initiatives that speak to and consider both student and staff experiences. For example, this collaboration has led to initiatives such as:
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Looking into the processes for undergraduate students’ supervisor/lab placements for their 4th year of study, leading to ongoing improvements in equality of opportunity for joining labs
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Developing a joint approach to mental health in across the division and in MPLS departments (Department of Materials specifically)
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Developing an overarching induction guidance document
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Supporting working parents and carers
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Improving support around disability and neurodivergence in MPLS, including delivering focus groups
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Creating and delivering a mentoring scheme for our BIPOC STEM Network
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Developing a mentorship programme for DPhil students from sub-Saharan Africa
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Supporting and promoting the Periodically Podcast, where Oxford students to share their experiences of having periods while studying for their chemistry degrees
More actions and impact can be found here.
Having students and staff steer these initiatives has ensured that our ED&I strategy and action plan continue to have positive local impacts on students and staff. By creating space for students and staff to highlight the barriers that they face to both thriving at Oxford and benefiting from potential ED&I initiatives, our ED&I Fellows scheme has enabled our division to put our efforts and resources into key areas.
What advice would you give to other students and staff who may wish to take a similar student-staff partnership approach?
One piece of advice we would share would be to accept the extra time it takes to set up student-staff partnerships and get everyone on board, because it is very much worth it down the line. Some Fellows also valued having more direction and teamworking, so specific projects or initiatives were preferred, while others valued more autonomy.
