JiscMail Logo
Email discussion lists for the UK Education and Research communities

Help for ADMIN-EO Archives


ADMIN-EO Archives

ADMIN-EO Archives


ADMIN-EO@JISCMAIL.AC.UK


View:

Message:

[

First

|

Previous

|

Next

|

Last

]

By Topic:

[

First

|

Previous

|

Next

|

Last

]

By Author:

[

First

|

Previous

|

Next

|

Last

]

Font:

Proportional Font

LISTSERV Archives

LISTSERV Archives

ADMIN-EO Home

ADMIN-EO Home

ADMIN-EO  2000

ADMIN-EO 2000

Options

Subscribe or Unsubscribe

Subscribe or Unsubscribe

Log In

Log In

Get Password

Get Password

Subject:

RE: Supply of academic staff data to the THES

From:

M Milne-Picken <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

[log in to unmask]

Date:

Fri, 31 Mar 2000 14:13:00 +0100

Content-Type:

text/plain

Parts/Attachments:

Parts/Attachments

text/plain (299 lines)

Apologies for Cross-posting.  I've copied this to the admin-eo list as I
know there are many on that list who will be interested (they'll have to
pick up the debate halfway through!).  Alison Goddard's article on page 3 of
today's THES gives some of the background as well.


I share some of Judy Evans's concerns (below) about the data that has been
supplied by HESA to the THES to look at institutions profile of academic
staff by gender/ethnicity, although I disagree with her about one aspect of
whether the THES data is useful.

I have no difficulty with the principle of comparing the SL and equivalent
grades in the pre-1992 universities with the PL grade in the post-1992
universities.  There are some marginal differences but in broad brush terms
they can be considered the same thing, and the base of staff thrown up is
quite significant in most institutions - typically of the order of 100+
staff.  A reasonable number to look at.

In terms of looking at gender of staff, I think there is considerable merit
in comparing these 'senior' academic staff, because institutional equal
opportunity commitment is likely to be most manifest in 'promoted' posts
than in 'all' posts.  We all know that far too many women academic staff are
kept at the lower grades and are passed over for promotion, and the analysis
commissioned by the THES is more likely to show such features than one that
included all academic posts.

The actual results in the table called 'SL/Researchers by Gender' are very
revealing and show very marked differences across the sector  I've sorted it
by % female and there is a very noticable difference between the pre- and
post- 1992 institutions.  Of the 30 institutions with the highest proportion
of females, for example, only 8 are pre-1992 and all of these are either
University of London colleges or ex-CATs or the Open University.  Indeed you
have to get down to 50th position to find an institution that is not either
post-1945 in its creation or a college of the University of London
(Manchester Vic).  Broadly speaking the 'older' (and more revered?) a
university is, the worse it appears to be in getting women into senior
academic posts.  There are of course exceptions, and some may be created by
data classification problems (eg Bournemouth looks anomalous and too low a
base, so I presume they have used different codes) but the general trend is
undeniable.

There are however some minor problems with this analysis not taking any
account of the subject base of the institution - obviously an institution
with a heavy weight towards science and technology is likely to show a
different gender balance to one with a high proportion of social science,
nursing or education, but in large multi-faculty institutions these
differences tend to iron out anyway (but that's why one needs to be cautious
about University of London colleges).

These figures are so interesting I've pasted them below this e-mail so that
everyone can see them and spot the guilty!  - apologies to Bournemouth if
their data was wrong!  Judy's institution and my own are in the top 10, so
while I'm sure we won't be resting on laurels, they do show that some
institutions at least have made some progress on breaking through the glass
ceiling, although much more needs to be done.

Where I agree with Judy is that the use by the THES of the Professors' grade
and the restricting of ethnicity solely to UK nationals is wrong.

The post-1992 institutions did not have a Professor grade and those awarded
the title tended to be paid either as PLs or Management grades (Heads of
Department/Deans etc).  Thus because field 25 in the HESA staff return is
generated from a payroll/grading record, the data is likely to be
meaningless for the post-1992 institutions.  A few of us have modified our
rewards system since 1992 and make use of code 71 - 'locally determined
contract - Professor' - in the HESA return (I have to say I went through all
of ours this year to make sure they were coded properly - in anticipation of
the data being used in this way!!).  But for the vast majority of post-1992
institutions the data is useless.

Likewise the ethnicity data is useless.  By excluding non-UK nationals, the
THES are tacitly discriminating against people who have lived in the UK for
decades, may have families at school here, etc, etc.  They are also
excluding 'not-knowns'.  This affects us particularly.  For many years we
refused as a matter of principle to supply nationality of staff as we didn't
believe it served any useful data collection purpose (there is some
codswallop about measuring the impact of widening EU membership in the
coding manual but that's just nonsense) and in our view it represented an
unnecessary intrusion into privacy.  We were told a couple of years ago we
were the only institution with 100% unknown nationality and so reluctantly
agreed to start supplying the data since everyone else seemed to be doing
it, but still have a high proportion of unknown.  [We didn't ask people
their nationality on our application form - only 'Do you need a Work
permit?' which is all you need to know in appointing them].

So I'm afraid the two tables on Professors are rubbish and the one on 'SLs
by ethnicity' is also quite useless.

As newspaper league tables go though, one out of four variables being
reasonably meaningful is probably well above average!!

Comment and brickbats welcome!

Mike Milne-Picken
Head of Planning & Performance Review
University of Central Lancashire
[log in to unmask]
www.uclan.ac.uk/planning
 ----------
From: Judy Evans
To: [log in to unmask]
Cc: [log in to unmask]; [log in to unmask]; [log in to unmask]
Subject: Supply of academic staff data to the THES
Date: 29 March 2000 16:28

Members of the hesa-pr list will already be aware of the data
requested by the Higher on academic staff that HESA have supplied,
for a presumed publication date of April 7th. I trust that
members of this list will have been alerted to it.

It would appear that there are a number of problems with the data
as it is currently provided, and I would welcome comments from
other list members.

The data provided by HESA focusses on professors, senior
lecturers and researchers only.  However, definitions of what IS
a professor, senior lecturer and researcher differ between the
pre-1992 universities and the post-1992 universities grading
structures, and under the current HESA coding structure the
post-1992 universities are potentially being disserved by the
HESA analysis.  As the HESA blue Reference volume confirms (page
240 of the 1997/98 volume), there is a clear problem with
analysis by staff grade when post-1992 universities grading
structures do not easily map to pre-1992 structures, but the HESA
analysis uses the pre-1992 structures to determine definitions,
thereby potentially skewing any analysis of the sector as a whole.

Thus, for our university, although we have some 40+ professors,
we do not appear at all in the data provided to the Higher, as we
have not coded them in any of the categories HESA have chosen to
use as indication of Professor status (codes 04, 34, 39, 42, 63
and 71 from field 25 - Grade).

Similarly, HESA have provided the Higher with two tables labelled
'Senior lecturers and researchers'. However, HESA's definition
(codes 03, 33, 38, 41, 62, 72 from field 25 - Grade)
serves to exclude all those actually coded as Senior Lecturer -
02 - the coding predominantly in force in post-1992 universities,
as well as other codes which may have been used by post-1992
universities in the absence of anything more appropriate (for
example, we have coded Academic Leader posts as 99, following
HESA guidance).

HESA's definitions would therefore appear to be very selective in
what they have decided actually REPRESENTS a professor, senior
lecturer or researcher. Mike Milne-Picken, in an email on the
data to hesa-pr suggests that it has been based on some notion of
'seniority' and senior salary level. But whatever the reason it
is still selective, and hence misleading.

For UNL this again results in the exclusion from the data
supplied to the Higher of some 280+ Senior Lecturers for a start,
and depending on how the Higher decide to present this
information is misleading and mis-informing.

And finally, ethnicity data is provided, but filtered to ONLY
include UK nationals. This is apparently what the Higher
requested, so we can only assume that the resulting article will
make this clear, but on the face of it the data is again
incomplete and therefore mis-representative. In our case, having
lost 280+ Senior Lecturers in the analysis due to the selective

nature of the definition of a senior lecturer (a proportion of
whom will be from ethnic groups), we loose a further 17 from the
resulting dataset of 82 because they are not UK nationals - and
end up with NO senior lecturer or researcher who is 'non-white',
as far as HESA is concerned!

I am sure colleagues will understand our concern. I would
appreciate comment!

Judy

 ----------------------
Judy Evans
Head of Management Information
University of North London
166-221 Holloway Road
London N7 8DB

tel : 0171 753 5146
fax : 0171 753 5049

email : [log in to unmask]

 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------
Senior Lecturers (pre-1992)/Principal Lecturers (post-1992) ranked by %
female, 1998-99
Institutions with more than 500 Academic staff in total
Source: HESA
Pasted by Mike Milne-Picken, University of Central Lancashire


Rank	Institution	% female 'senior' lecturers and researchers
1	Goldsmiths College	42.6%
2	University of Derby	41.3%
3	University of Hertfordshire	38.1%
4	University of London (Institutes and activities)	38.0%
5	The University of North London	37.8%
6	The University of Central England in Birmingham	37.2%
7	The University of Central Lancashire	37.0%
8	The London Institute	36.8%
9	The University of Westminster	35.4%
10	City University	34.2%
11	Oxford Brookes University	33.9%
12	The Open University	33.3%
13	Middlesex University	32.9%
14	St George's Hospital Medical School	32.8%
15	Leeds Metropolitan University	32.4%
16	Coventry University	31.9%
17	Anglia Polytechnic University	30.8%
18	The University of Greenwich	30.3%
19	The University of East London	29.3%
20	The Robert Gordon University	28.9%
21	Staffordshire University	28.9%
22	Royal Holloway and Bedford New College	28.8%
23	The University of Wolverhampton	28.7%
24	The University of Brighton	28.4%
25	Napier University	28.2%
26	Glasgow Caledonian University	28.0%
27	The University of Salford	28.0%
28	University of Luton	27.8%
29	The University of Northumbria at Newcastle	27.0%
30	King's College London	26.8%
31	The University of Teesside	26.4%
32	Sheffield Hallam University	25.9%
33	University College London	25.7%
34	The University of Essex	25.5%
35	Liverpool John Moores University	25.5%
36	University of the West of England, Bristol	25.5%
37	The University of Huddersfield	25.4%
38	Queen Mary and Westfield College	24.9%
39	The Manchester Metropolitan University	24.8%
40	South Bank University	24.8%
41	The University of Keele	24.2%
42	De Montfort University	24.0%
43	Brunel University	22.5%
44	The University of Sunderland	22.5%
45	The University of Bradford	22.2%
46	London School of Economics and Political Science	22.2%
47	The University of Warwick	22.2%
48	University of Wales College of Medicine	21.7%
49	Imperial College of Science, Technology & Medicine	21.2%
50	University of Manchester	20.9%
51	The University of Lancaster	20.8%
52	The University of East Anglia	20.7%
53	The Nottingham Trent University	20.4%
54	The University of Sheffield	20.2%
55	The University of Portsmouth	20.2%
56	The University of Sussex	19.7%
57	The University of Surrey	19.5%
58	The University of Aberdeen	18.3%
59	Southampton Institute	18.2%
60	The University of York	18.2%
61	The Queen's University of Belfast	17.9%
62	The University of Strathclyde	17.8%
63	University of Glamorgan	17.6%
64	The University of Dundee	17.5%
65	The University of Glasgow	17.4%
66	The University of Kent at Canterbury	17.3%
67	The University of Birmingham	17.2%
68	The University of Stirling	16.8%
69	The University of Nottingham	16.8%
70	The University of Oxford	16.7%
71	The University of Southampton	16.7%
72	The University of Leeds	16.6%
73	The University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne	16.2%
74	The University of Bristol	16.2%
75	University of Ulster	16.0%
76	London Guildhall University	15.7%
77	The University of Edinburgh	15.5%
78	The University of Hull	15.1%
79	The University of Leicester	14.7%
80	The University of Reading	14.5%
81	The University of Liverpool	14.5%
82	Loughborough University	13.8%
83	The University of Plymouth	13.7%
84	The University of Exeter	13.7%
85	University of Wales, Bangor	13.3%
86	University of Wales, Aberystwyth	13.0%
87	University of Wales, Swansea	12.5%
88	The University of Cambridge	11.6%
89	University of Durham	10.8%
90	The University of Manchester Institute of Science & Technology
10.2%
91	Cranfield University	10.1%
92	The University of St Andrews	9.3%
93	Cardiff University	9.0%
94	The University of Bath	8.6%
95	Heriot-Watt University	4.7%
96	Bournemouth University	4.2%




%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

Top of Message | Previous Page | Permalink

JiscMail Tools


RSS Feeds and Sharing


Advanced Options


Archives

March 2024
February 2024
January 2024
December 2023
November 2023
October 2023
September 2023
August 2023
July 2023
June 2023
May 2023
April 2023
March 2023
February 2023
January 2023
December 2022
November 2022
October 2022
September 2022
August 2022
July 2022
June 2022
May 2022
April 2022
March 2022
February 2022
January 2022
December 2021
November 2021
October 2021
September 2021
August 2021
July 2021
June 2021
May 2021
April 2021
March 2021
February 2021
January 2021
December 2020
November 2020
October 2020
September 2020
August 2020
July 2020
June 2020
May 2020
April 2020
March 2020
February 2020
January 2020
December 2019
November 2019
October 2019
September 2019
August 2019
July 2019
June 2019
May 2019
April 2019
March 2019
February 2019
January 2019
December 2018
November 2018
October 2018
September 2018
August 2018
July 2018
June 2018
May 2018
April 2018
March 2018
February 2018
January 2018
December 2017
November 2017
October 2017
September 2017
August 2017
July 2017
June 2017
May 2017
April 2017
March 2017
February 2017
January 2017
December 2016
November 2016
October 2016
September 2016
August 2016
July 2016
June 2016
May 2016
April 2016
March 2016
February 2016
January 2016
December 2015
November 2015
October 2015
September 2015
August 2015
July 2015
June 2015
May 2015
April 2015
March 2015
February 2015
January 2015
December 2014
November 2014
October 2014
September 2014
August 2014
July 2014
June 2014
May 2014
April 2014
March 2014
February 2014
January 2014
December 2013
November 2013
October 2013
September 2013
August 2013
July 2013
June 2013
May 2013
April 2013
March 2013
February 2013
January 2013
December 2012
November 2012
October 2012
September 2012
August 2012
July 2012
June 2012
May 2012
April 2012
March 2012
February 2012
January 2012
December 2011
November 2011
October 2011
September 2011
August 2011
July 2011
June 2011
May 2011
April 2011
March 2011
February 2011
January 2011
December 2010
November 2010
October 2010
September 2010
August 2010
July 2010
June 2010
May 2010
April 2010
March 2010
February 2010
January 2010
December 2009
November 2009
October 2009
September 2009
August 2009
July 2009
June 2009
May 2009
April 2009
March 2009
February 2009
January 2009
December 2008
November 2008
October 2008
September 2008
August 2008
July 2008
June 2008
May 2008
April 2008
March 2008
February 2008
January 2008
December 2007
November 2007
October 2007
September 2007
August 2007
July 2007
June 2007
May 2007
April 2007
March 2007
February 2007
January 2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000
1999
1998


JiscMail is a Jisc service.

View our service policies at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/policyandsecurity/ and Jisc's privacy policy at https://www.jisc.ac.uk/website/privacy-notice

For help and support help@jisc.ac.uk

Secured by F-Secure Anti-Virus CataList Email List Search Powered by the LISTSERV Email List Manager