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Launched April 2003: Meeting The Challenge: Managing Equality and Diversity in Higher Education Project website: www.coventry.ac.uk/equal Project Leader: Karen Ross - [log in to unmask] The Meeting the Challenge resource pack has been developed by Coventry University and the University of Warwick, with funding from HEFCE's Good Management Practice Fund. The aim of the pack, which comprises a film and accompanying booklet, is to raise awareness and stimulate discussion about staff equality and diversity issues. Although there are specific duties and responsibilities imposed on the HE sector by equality legislation, the effectiveness and implementation of national legislation as well as local policy can be significantly undermined by an unresponsive and uncaring institutional or departmental culture. The film is made in the style of a docu-drama and available in both VHS and CD formats and in a subtitled version. It is approximately 35 minutes long and includes an introduction and seven scenes, each focusing on specific aspects of inequality and diversity. The approach we have used in the film is to show how particular behaviours and attitudes contribute to or challenge existing cultural assumptions about characteristics such as gender, age, race, sexuality and disability and explores issues of power and control within and between staff groups. The film is intended to provoke discussion amongst its viewers about the extent to which they recognise aspects of their own institutional or departmental culture reflected in the scenes and if not, how and why the situation is different in their workplace. Using a mix of discussion themes and group activities elaborated in the booklet, we hope that viewers/participants will develop strategies to deal more effectively with specific equality and diversity issues which have relevance to their own particular HEI . The booklet also includes additional material such as sources of further information about equality and diversity issues including current and draft legislation and guidance (section 4) and case studies of good and not so good practice (sections 2 and 3). There is also a section on useful contacts and websites (section 5). The good practice examples and the list of contacts and further reading are merely indicative rather than exhaustive. We believe that the resource pack will be most effective in a group training context facilitated either by in-house or external equality trainers. The film has been made to be viewed in its entirety first, and then re-viewed on a scene-by-scene basis to gain a better appreciation of particular issues and contexts, such as recruitment, disability awareness or dignity at work. However, we acknowledge that viewing the whole film at once might not always be possible, so we have included a brief synopsis of each scene, together with the key points covered, so that the film can also work on a more segmented basis. We believe that the resource pack will be most effective if it is used in a mixed group of managers and their staff, in order to generate discussion on different experiences from different perspectives. As the project is being supported by HEFCE, one copy of the resource pack will be sent free of charge to the Director of Personnel/Human Resources in every HEI in England during April 2003. HEIs in Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Northern Ireland and elsewhere should contact Jane Osmond for information on how to purchase their own copy. Jane Osmond Diversity Training Project Coventry University Tel: 024 7688 7462 ________________________________________________________________________ ______-