School of Health & Psychological Sciences achieves Athena Swan Bronze Award renewal

The School of Health & Psychological Sciences (SHPS) at City, University of London has been awarded the Athena Swan Bronze Award in recognition of its commitment to gender equality.

Established by Advance HE in 2005, the Athena Swan Charter is a framework used to support and transform gender equality within higher education and research. The School of Health Sciences was awarded the Bronze Award in 2018.  In 2020, the former School of Arts and Social Sciences, where the Department of Psychology was based at the time, was also awarded the Bronze Athena Swan Award. Both these applications included extensive action plans and measurable outcomes on which Schools should focus.

Following an organisational restructure in summer 2022, the new School of Health & Psychological Sciences (SHPS) began to review progress against its action plans as an SHPS self-assessment team and worked together to develop a new action plan for the next five years to 2028.

In September 2023, the self-assessment team put forward their application to renew its Bronze Award under the Transformed UK Athena Swan Charter, and it received news of its successful application in December 2023.

Benefits of the transformed Charter include a greater focus on autonomy and flexibility, reduced administrative burden for applicants, and a developmental and supportive approach. This paradigm shift empowered the Self-Assessment Team to design an action plan tailored to SHPS’s unique needs.

The new action plan lays out five key priority areas for SHPS focused on gender equality with an intersectional lens. It includes areas focused on equity in staff development and progression; building an inclusive culture and community; affirming supportive structures for different working patterns; ensuring the student journey is inclusive and equitable, and enhancing processes and infrastructures for gender equality work to make the most of collaboration and good practice across the university and beyond.

Professor Debra Salmon, Dean of SHPS, said:

The renewal of our Athena Swan Bronze Award is a testament to the collective efforts of colleagues across the School of Health & Psychological Sciences in promoting and upholding the values of inclusivity, and it reaffirms our focus on continuous improvement. I would like to recognise and thank all those involved in preparing and finalising our application, and look forward to working with colleagues towards even greater milestones in the journey to gender equality.

We are delighted that Advance HE have conferred the School of Health and Psychological Sciences with an Athena Swan Bronze Award in recognition of our gender equality work in the School. The renewal of our Bronze Award recognises our continued commitment to gender equality and provides a mandate for us to continue our important work in this area. Thanks to all the Athena Swan team here in SHPS for all their hard work in support of this process. We look forward to our continued partnership with colleagues in progressing gender equality.