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The University of Abertay Dundee is providing training to raise staff awareness of equality and diversity issues, which have come to the fore in higher education recently, by implementing a number of Marshall ACM’s e-learning courses, starting with ‘Diversity in the Workplace’.

The University’s Equality & Diversity Sub-Committee, which has Mr James Nicholson (Head of Student Services) as its Chair and Mr Colin Grethè (Head of Human Resources) as its Vice-Chair, has taken the lead in developing the programme.

‘Diversity in the Workplace’ focuses on helping the University to address equality and diversity issues.This extends beyond statutory legislation of the traditional boundaries of sex, race and disability discrimination.Its purpose is threefold: it aims to help users to increase their familiarity with equal opportunities legislation, gain an understanding of the broader issues of diversity and equal opportunities, and ultimately to better understand their responsibilities and rights as a member of the staff of the University.

Dr Eamon Greenwood, Secretariat, University of Abertay Dundee, and one of the first to participate in the online training, says, “I found the course to be comprehensive, easily-understood, reasonably quick to complete, pitched at the right level and attractive to work through”.

Mr Colin Grethè, says, “The University acknowledges the centrally-important purpose of supporting activity in equality and diversity because we have a very culturally diverse working and learning community, and need to ensure we all understand and respect differences that reflect such a society.This training will help further develop and maintain an inclusive environment in which everyone is encouraged to fulfil their potential, where students and staff feel that their contribution is valued, and in which staff members are aware of their responsibilities when it comes to complying with the relevant legislation. Subsequently, this will also help minimise the risk of unlawful discrimination and the associated difficulties such practices can raise”.

The training provides a summary of a wide range of topics germane to the area of equal opportunities promotion, including relevant legislation (such as the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000, discrimination (on grounds of gender, gender re-assignment, sexual orientation, race, disability, religion/belief or age), harassment and stereotyping.

The Marshall ACM module is a very flexible e-learning package.Although the complete module only takes approximately an hour to fully complete, the training can be undertaken at a time that is convenient to the user and allows the programme to be divided into manageable time slots.Users can go back to any of the sections to review the summary information, and they undertake a basic test upon completion of the module to ensure understanding.The module also contains references to suggestions for further relevant reading.