Philip

Many thanks for this encouraging response.  I would be very interested to
hear from other list members about lessons learnt from QLP and how it could
be broadened to other LIS sectors and domains related to LIS.

regards

Mary

At 18:19 22/01/02 +0000, Philip Pothen wrote:
>Dear Diversity List members,
>
>Many thanks to Mary for her very interesting message about
>the efforts of Uni of Wolverhampton to improve the ethnic
>profile of its staff to match its student population. In my
>experience of education, this is a major challenge in
>general. I agree with you, Mary, that the way forward must
>be to look at profession-wide issues of recruitment. The LA
>clearly has a major role to play in this, as do library
>schools, and I think the DC, when it becomes a full group
>of the LA will have important leverage here. I think too,
>as you say, that within the profession and perhaps at some
>stage within the DC too, we need to be addressing the
>serious under-representation of Black and Minority Ethnic
>library and learning resource staff within the academic
>sector, and possibly other sectors, for example, special
>libraries, and wider afield, the museum and archives
>sectors. When it becomes more established, I hope the DC
>will begin to think about some of these broader questions.
>
>The Quality Leaders Project is an excellent example of how
>positive action might begin to address some of the
>challenges you mention. I wonder if any list members
>directly involved in the QLP might like to respond about
>what we've learnt from the project about these questions
>and how it might, in time and with the right support from
>the right organisations, be broadened to include BME
>quality leaders in other sectors than the public library
>field. It might be good to get the list talking about these
>important questions.
>
>Best wishes,
>
>Philip
>
>---------------------------------------------
>
>Dear Diversity Council List members
>
>First of all let me introduce myself.  I am Director of
>Learning Centres at
>the University of Wolverhampton responsible for library,
>information, open
>access IT and central learning support for a population of
>23k students
>based on 5 campuses and 4 hospitals in the West Midlands.
>I joined your
>email discussion list some weeks ago having read about the
>council and its
>work over the past year or so in the LAR.
>
>Our university is concerned to improve the ethnic profile
>of its staff to
>match more closely the diversity of our student population
>across 10
>academic schools.  Ethnic minority entrants to these
>schools range from
>over 50% in the case of Legal Studies to 11% in the case of
>Sports,
>Performing Arts & Leisure.  In 5 of the schools 30% or more
>entrants come
>from ethnic minority backgrounds.
>
>To help progress us on the route to reflecting our student
>population
>better in our staffing, the university has set up a Desired
>Staffing
>Profile initiative which aims to assist service areas and
>schools in
>addressing the diversity agenda .   The ethnic profile of
>Learning Centre
>staff has been significantly lower than other service areas
>and this has
>led me to set up a project within the service to examine
>the issues and
>identify ways of addressing them .   We recently
>commissioned a study to
>support the project from a company called People Matters
>and they reported
>toward the end of last year.
>
>One if the significant issues which People Matters report
>confirmed for us
>was that the LIS profession does not appeal strongly to
>candidates from
>ethnic minority backgrounds in the UK and that this is
>particularly marked
>in the case of jobs outside the public library sector,
>where some success
>is being achieved.  While People Matters identified areas
>for action within
>our service and within the university it is clear that we
>cannot change the
>position on our own.  We conclude this not in a defeatist
>way but in the
>context that the most recent figures I have seen of LA
>members from ethnic
>minority backgrounds is 2.2%.
>
>I am interested in ideas from the Diversity Council on how
>colleagues from
>different parts of the profession can pull together to
>place this issue
>more at the forefront of those who can influence progress.
>I have talked
>to Bob McKee about the issues and know that he is very
>supportive.  I have
>also discussed the agenda with Professor Judith Elkin, Dean
>of Faculty of
>Computing, Information and English at our neighbour
>institution,the
>University of Central England in Birmingham, which offers
>courses in
>Information & Library Management and Studies.  I am
>currently a member of
>the Executive Board of SCONUL, the Society of College,
>National and
>University Libraries and through that body would be happy
>to seek to
>promote ideas for change in the HE LIS sector.
>
>I look forward to hearing ideas and comment from members of
>the list.
>
>regards
>
>Mary
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>         Mary Heaney,
>         Director of Learning Centres
>         University of Wolverhampton
>         ML Block, 54 Stafford St
>         Wolverhampton
>         WV1 1NJ, UK
>
>         Tel: +44 (0)1902 322302 (direct) or +44 (0) 1902
>32100 (PABX)
>         Fax: +44 (0)1902 322668
>         Learning Centres homepage: http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>***************************************************************
>Dr Philip Pothen
>DNER/RDN Communications Manager,
>JISC DNER Office,
>King's College London,
>Strand Bridge House,
>3rd Floor,
>138-142 The Strand,
>London WC2R 1HH
>
>Tel:    020 7848 2935
>Mobile: 07887 564 006
>Fax:    020 7848 2939
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