Equal Opportunities Policy for Students

1. Policy Statement

The College seeks to enrol a learner population, which reflects the diverse community at large, because we value the individual contributions of all people. We will treat all learners with respect and dignity and provide a learning and working environment free from unlawful discrimination, harassment or victimisation. To this end, within the framework of the law and best practice, we are committed, wherever practicable, to achieving and maintaining a campus, which broadly reflects the local community.

The College will not tolerate any form of behaviour or activity that discriminates on the grounds of gender, marital status, family responsibilities, sexual orientation, colour, race, nationality, religious belief, ethnicity, disability, age and unrelated criminal convictions.

No learner or potential learner should be disadvantaged or treated less favourably because of conditions or requirements which cannot be justified and the college will seek to make reasonable adjustments to its arrangements and premises with a view to avoiding any disadvantages for disabled people. Action will be taken to ensure that individuals are treated equally and fairly and that decisions on enrolment and progression are based solely on objective and course related criteria.

2. Implementing the Policy

The college will challenge inequality, prejudice and discrimination and seeks to provide a learning environment free from harassment and discrimination.

The college embraces diversity in all its aspects, treating its actual and potential learners with respect and seeks to ensure that individuals are not disadvantaged or treated less favourably because of factors not related to their studies.

In order to achieve this, South Cheshire College seeks to ensure that:

Stakeholders, including governors, staff, learners, employers (including work placement providers) and contractors, are aware of the college's equal opportunities policy and the action needed for its implementation.
Staff, learners and their sponsors (including work placement providers) are aware of the value placed upon equal opportunity and that action may be taken in the event of any material breach of the policy.
Governors and staff have access to information, which assists them to plan, implement and monitor actions to carry out their responsibilities under the policy.
The college's publicity materials present appropriate and positive messages about equality and diversity.
Recruitment procedures are designed to eliminate bias.
Schemes of work, lesson content and teaching resources demonstrate sensitivity to issues of cultural diversity, disability and gender.
Learners have access to support and facilities.
Any learner who believes s/he has been discriminated against or treated unfairly can use the procedures within the Student and Harassment Policy and/or the Complaints procedure.

3. Monitoring Progress

In order to monitor the effectiveness of this policy, the following information relating to equality and diversity will be collected and analysed:

Profiles of learners according to gender, race and disability
Attendance rates, retention rates, achievement rates (reports from MIS and Cheshire & Warrington LSC are presented to managers and governors)
Applications to and enrolments on programmes (these are reviewed by the Director of Marketing and Operations)
Schemes of work and lesson observation (these are monitored by Quality Managers and Heads of Curriculum and through the Classroom Observation process)
Work placements including success rates, satisfaction levels and job offers
Disciplinary action
Complaints by learners
Satisfaction surveys
Destination analysis (these are reviewed within faculties and cross-college reports are made to governors)

4. Positive action

To rectify disadvantages revealed by monitoring and review the college undertakes to follow positive action measures allowed by law within the bounds of legal requirements, funding and reasonableness. Such measures include:

Provision of facilities or services to meet the required needs of people from identified under-represented groups.
Provision of schemes or courses designed to meet the particular needs and enhance the skills of under-represented groups.
Initiatives to encourage applications from under-represented groups.
Anticipatory reasonable adjustments to ensure that disabled learners can access learning, including steps that involve treating disabled persons more favourably than other persons.

5. Review

This policy will be reviewed biennially by the Equality Forum, to ensure that the college is implementing legislative developments and following good practice.

JUNE 2008

Download the Equality and Diversity (students) Annual Report 2008/9 (126KB pdf document)*

* Adobe Acrobat files. If you have any difficulties accessing, or if they display incorrectly, you will need the latest edition of Adobe Acrobat Reader which can be downloaded FREE from www.adobe.com.