Inclusive student support services - Ideas on how to provide effective support

The Equality Challenge Unit has published ideas of how to provide effective support for all students whatever their protected characteristics or backgrounds. How does your practice shape up?

Currently, there is little information on how student support services in colleges are accessed by different groups of students or whether they effectively meet the needs of all students, particularly how protected characteristics – age, disability, gender identity, pregnancy and maternity status, race, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation – play a part.

The Equality Challenge Unit has published ideas of how to provide effective support for all students whatever their protected characteristics or backgrounds. For example:

Colleges could consider developing methods to better understand the diversity within their student body, such as:

• bringing questions of support requirements into interviewing procedures
• researching the experience of different groups of students they have, for example black and minority ethnic students, to provide specific support if required
• recruiting student ambassadors from protected characteristic groups or developing a buddying system to improve levels of disclosure
• recording equality data of students accessing support services and benchmarking against monitoring data of all students
• conducting focus groups with a range of students from different groups during their college experience to understand their support needs and identify any gaps in existing provision
• targeting support for students during and post pregnancy or for students during gender transition
• promoting equality and diversity days at the college, involving students, student associations and local awareness groups where relevant
• promoting good relations via awareness-raising events in libraries, and competitions
• providing support to enable student groups to convene, for example a lesbian, gay and bisexual society. This could involve providing facilities or a page on the college website or intranet
• linking protected characteristics within student support services information on the college website, within induction and in relevant printed materials
• providing details of the support available to students that teaching staff could share with or direct students to at any opportunity
• sending an email or text to alert students to any changes to timetable or venue, or to plan and confirm any special arrangements for students (for example part-time students, disabled students or those with caring responsibilities)
• developing processes and enabling regular opportunities for team work between teaching and student support services staff

To see more ideas from the Equality Challenge Unit, click here