There are many questions surrounding gender and diversity at a university:
How can I incorporate diversity into teaching? Which gender aspects can be considered when introducing and accrediting new Degree Courses ? How can we evaluate our university teaching with regard to equality and gender justice? What is gender from the perspective of gender studies?
On these pages you will find a collection of online tools on the topic of diversity and how to deal with it, which can support you in your work.
This video shows how important it is to enable all people to have equal access to a good education and how important it is to raise awareness of diversity in everyday university life.
Diversity wheel
While diversity characteristics such as age, gender or skin color often visible attention, it is primarily diversity characteristics such as socioeconomic background, cultural origin, religion/worldview, family situation or chronic illness that tend to invisible .
The diversity wheel makes these characteristics recognizable and distinguishes the inner dimension, whose characteristics are difficult to change, from the outer dimension, whose characteristics can be changed, but are nevertheless strongly personality-shaping.
And at a university, students also bring their individual biographies into their studies: sociocultural backgrounds, different learning styles and types, gender-specific aspects, different language skills, caregiving responsibilities, the need for study financing, etc.
With regard to university teaching, this heterogeneity of student groups necessitates individual prerequisites, needs, and expectations at universities. This creates a fundamental tension for instructors. On the one hand, they are expected to expect the same academic performance from all students. On the other hand, they are expected to consider individual backgrounds. This task requires transparent "fair inequality" and a continuous re-evaluation of our commitment to contributing to greater equality of opportunity in the education system. After all, we find no truly diversity-neutral spaces, not even in teaching.
