Call for participants: Student focus groups on race equality

Students walking down stairs

We are committed to tackling racial inequalities and making our University a more equal, diverse and inclusive place to be, where everyone, regardless of their race, ethnicity, or national origin, can succeed.

Following on from the survey on race equality we ran earlier this year, and as the next step in data collection for our Race Equality Charter (REC) application, we are organising a series of online focus groups to gain deeper insight into diverse students’ experiences, exploring key themes from the REC survey and to discuss the concrete measures we might take for helping to eliminate racial discrimination at Liverpool.

Register your interest

Students are invited to register their interest for the following focus groups:

  • Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic (BAME) Student Experience (undergraduate students)
  • Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic (BAME) Student Experience (postgraduate students)
  • Black Student Experience (all study levels)
  • Chinese Student Experience (all study levels)

If you are interested in participating in a focus group, please complete this online form. Please note, you are welcome to select more than one group. As a thank you for taking part we will also be providing all participants with a £10 Liverpool ONE voucher.

Format and confidentiality

The student focus groups, which will run between dates 16-25 November, will all take place online via Zoom and will be fully facilitated by an external consultant, Dr Barbara Brown, Diversity & Inclusion Consultant and Coach at Diverse Matters.

It is really important that participants feel comfortable to share their experiences and views in a safe and confidential space, and this is why we have taken the decision to run these groups solely through an external facilitator without the attendance of University staff.

All findings from the groups will be completely anonymised and any comments will have any identifying (e.g. demographic) information redacted before the report is shared with the University.

Further information

The focus groups are just part of the University’s commitment to tackling racial inequalities. The University signed up to the principles of Advance HE’s Race Equality Charter last year as part of a wider anti-racism action plan. This provides an important framework for our work to tackle racial inequalities and work is already underway in this area.

The next step is to release a University-wide report sharing the main themes to come from both the survey and focus groups and an overview of our action plan to tackle these.