Promoting inclusive higher education systems is a key priority for Europe. The European Universities Association has recently published a report which examined the way 159 European Higher Education Institutions engage with and promote diversity, equity and inclusion. This report showed that training on diversity, equity and inclusion mainly targets academic teaching staff leaving the non-academic staff with very few opportunities for training with inclusive methods and tools. Even when the institutions create measures to increase diversity among staff, they mainly focus on gender equality. There are only a few institutions that have set quantitative targets that consider less represented groups such as academics with diverse ethnic, cultural and migration background, and religion. In addition, only one third of responding institutions provide training to staff on topics like intercultural communication and anti-bias.
Research shows that very few institutions have considered to develop practices that support the inclusion of diverse members with ethnic, cultural and migration background. This is also evident in the partner countries, Cyprus, Belgium, Finland, Romania and Greece, where policies and practices focus in promoting diversity and neglect the importance of inclusion.
This project was developed based on several policies focusing on inclusion that European Commission issued over the past few years. In particular, the Yerevan Communique of 2015 placed highly the commitment for social inclusion in Higher Education, by widening disadvantaged and underrepresented students’ access and completion of tertiary education. Also, the Renewed EU Agenda for Higher Education, adopted by European Commission in 2017, sets one of the four goals for European cooperation in Higher Education to be: “Building inclusive and connected higher education”. Additionally, the Bologna Process suggests that European Higher Education Institutions reform their policies in order to facilitate student and staff mobility, making HE more inclusive and accessible.
The project aims:
1. To support higher education providers to design, implement, and monitor effective inclusive policies and practices.
2. To build the competences of learning designers and academics to design inclusive learning programs.
3. To improve the supply of high quality inclusive higher education opportunities for all.
4. To engage all key stakeholders in inclusive practices
These objectives will be met via 3 outcomes:
IO1: Toolkit for inclusion in Higher Education - a toolkit for administrators and policy-makers at higher education institutions to support them in developing inclusive policies.
IO2: Design and deliver a blended training for learning designers and academics - a training course for learning designers and academics on how to design inclusive education programs.
IO3: E-learning platform and MOOC – an e-learning platform and MOOC on inclusive practices for academics and support staff.
