Community Impact Award: shortlist

1. Safia Chaudhry

Safia exemplifies innovative, and collaborative EDI leadership strengthening UCL’s long-term ambition to be an inclusive institution. As UCL Staff Muslim Network’s founding member, Safia established a vital community, growing membership to over 250 staff within a year. The Network provides a space where staff feel heard, valued, and empowered to influence institutional change.

Safia's work directly advances UCL’s strategic priority to create conditions that enable difficult and sensitive questions to be navigated. Through contribution to Central EDI’s Faith Action Plan, Safia helped surface systemic barriers experienced by Muslim staff/students, informing emerging research and strengthening the institutional evidence-base for inclusive policy development. Additionally, Safia proactively engages with student communities, like ISOC, to identify shared barriers, particularly around prayer space provision, translating dialogue into collaborative action.

Safia’s enabled difficult conversations around identity, and a sense of belonging has had widespread impact across UCL. She instigated the establishment of other faith-based staff networks, including Jewish and Christian Staff Networks, embedding sustainable, best practices and encouraging shared ownership of inclusion.

Demonstrating rigour and innovation, Safia designed creative, low-cost solutions to embed inclusion into UCL. She led UCL’s first-ever Eid gathering as part of the UCL200 celebrations, securing funding and delivering an impactful event attended by ~60 staff, with testimonials highlighting its importance for belonging and visibility. In response to a documented increase in Islamophobia highlighted in UCL’s Report and Support, Safia connected the Muslim Network with EDI leadership to shape early plans for institutional training. She independently sourced Islamophobia Awareness training from a specialist non-profit organisation, setting the platform for standardised institutional training.

Collectively, Safia’s vision, leadership, and commitment enhances UCL’s vision of fostering a mutually respectful, innovative, and inclusive community enabling staff to thrive, contributes to lasting institutional change and facilitating UCL’s mission to inspire staff to transform how the world is understood.

Safia’s work has delivered tangible and lasting change across UCL. The Staff Eid event generated strong in-person testimonials, with attendees reporting increased connection, visibility and belonging. Engagement with UCL ISOC has directly contributed to improvements in prayer space provision, enhancing safety and inclusion for Muslim staff and students. Safia led an Islamophobia Awareness webinar attended by 60–70 staff, increasing institutional understanding. The establishment of a Staff Muslim Network, with over 250 members and growing, created a sustainable platform for joined-up conversations, peer support and issues escalation that previously did not exist at UCL. In line with the needs of the community, Safia has gone out of her way to source speakers on Islamic, ethical finance solutions in the UK.

Safia delivered all this alongside her substantive role as Teaching/Research Degree Administrator, during a period of organisational restructuring and role uncertainty triggered by EASE. Despite this, she consistently provides a compassionate space for over 250 staff, contributed to Central EDI’s Faith Action Plan, served as a Wellbeing Champion, and led multiple initiatives outside contracted hours including evenings, weekends and annual leave. As the Muslim Network lacks funding, Safia has self-funded food for our lunchtime gatherings. Her commitment during personal and professional challenges demonstrates exceptional dedication well beyond her role requirements. She carried all of this with an unseen humble manner.

2. Mathew Grech Sollars

Matt meets the purpose of this award through his thoughtful and sustained leadership in fostering an inclusive, supportive culture at UCL. As lead of the Mental Health Working Group, he has driven an impactful seminar series addressing real challenges faced by staff and students. Topics such as “Boundaries Without Guilt: Saying No to Stay Well,” “Subtle, but Harmful: Recognising and Responding to Microaggressions,” and “Dealing with Rejection and Giving Effective, Constructive Feedback” demonstrate his commitment to practical, relevant support. These sessions equip participants with tools to navigate wellbeing, communication, and inclusion in everyday academic life.

Alongside this, Matt’s leadership of the Athena Swan group have advanced meaningful progress on gender equity, helping shape strategies that promote representation, fairness, and opportunity. His work reflects a holistic approach to inclusion, recognising the intersection between wellbeing and equality.

Matt’s leadership is collaborative, empathetic, and action-oriented. By creating spaces for open dialogue and delivering initiatives with tangible impact, he goes beyond expectations to strengthen community, empower individuals, and embed lasting cultural change across UCL.

Matthew’s contributions have driven meaningful and lasting change within the department and across UCL. Through his leadership of the Mental Health Working Group, he has normalised conversations around wellbeing and introduced practical support through targeted seminars, equipping staff and students with tools to navigate challenges. His work with the Athena Swan group has strengthened gender equity initiatives, influencing policies and practices that improve representation and inclusion. By embedding these efforts into everyday culture, Matt has not only raised awareness but also enabled tangible shifts in behaviour, engagement, and support systems, creating a more inclusive, responsive, and supportive environment.

Matt’s achievements go well beyond the expectations of his formal role through sustained, voluntary leadership in areas critical to community wellbeing and inclusion. Leading the Mental Health Working Group, he has designed and delivered a comprehensive seminar series addressing complex, often overlooked challenges, requiring significant time, initiative, and emotional labour outside core responsibilities. His active role in the Athena Swan group further demonstrates his commitment to advancing equity through strategic, collaborative work that shapes departmental culture and practice. These contributions are not mandated but reflect proactive leadership, personal dedication, and a genuine commitment to driving positive, lasting change across UCL.

Matthew has gone the extra mile in championing EDI by translating institutional priorities into visible, practical action. Through his leadership of the Mental Health Working Group, he has curated an impactful seminar series tackling nuanced topics such as setting boundaries, recognising microaggressions, and responding constructively to rejection—areas often overlooked but critical to an inclusive culture. His work ensures that EDI is not abstract, but embedded in everyday behaviours and conversations. In parallel, his contributions to Athena Swan have supported meaningful, evidence-based progress on gender equity, influencing both policy and practice. Matthew’s ability to connect wellbeing with inclusion has strengthened engagement across staff and students, fostering openness, trust, and participation. As a result, his work has helped create a more supportive, self-aware community at UCL and set a strong example of how EDI can be actively lived, not just discussed.

3. Professor Simon Lock and Dr Emma Jones

In response to UCL Staff Survey data, where over 40% of LGBTQ+ staff reported not feeling fully able to be open at work, Simon and Emma conducted in-depth qualitative research to explore the lived experiences of LGBTQ+ staff across UCL. The study involved 81 interviews with academic and professional services staff from every faculty. It adopted an intersectional approach to capture the diversity and complexity of LGBTQ+ identities and experiences, highlighting existing good practices as well as areas for change and development. This groundbreaking research, the largest study of LGBTQ+ staff in HE globally, continues UCL’s legacy of striving to be an inclusive university where staff feel valued and can thrive. The report has been welcomed and endorsed by Pro-Provost (Equity & Inclusion).
Since the report was published in June 2025, to ensure wide community impact, Simon and Emma have actively engaged institutional stakeholders with its findings and staff‑driven recommendations, motivating colleagues to advance a more inclusive university culture for all LGBTQ+ people. They have workshopped the findings and delivered tailored recommendations to…senior leadership teams.

Learnings from this project underpin the development of the new UCL LGBTQ+ Action Plan. College-level discussions into developing safety advice for LGBTQ+ staff travelling abroad have started. More specifically the data fed into and changed planning for a proposed Educational Hub in Dubai to ensure that LGBTQ+ staff are safe. The results of the project also supported the development of an iSD project that is investigating how trans and non-binary students can change their names/gender across multiple platforms across UCL. The workshops are empowering faculty and department leadership teams to design and enact localised responses to the report findings.

Simon and Emma both make significant contributions to an inclusive culture at UCL via multiple voluntary community leadership roles: Simon’s work as Co-Chair of LESG, and Co-Director of qUCL and via Emma’s work on the IOE ILAG, and as Co-Director of the UCL GFRN (2021-2025). Their achievements go beyond their normal academic job role. Their commitment to community and stakeholder engagement has positively transformed the culture for LGBTQ+ staff at UCL. Their work is now serving as a beacon of rigor and innovation UCL and other UK HEIs are looking to this project as an example of EDI best practice.

The data from Simon and Emma’s LGBTQ+ staff research project underpinned the design of the first ever LGBTQ+ action plan at UCL providing a conduit for staff experiences and community recommendations to create a more inclusive university culture. This plan has driven college-wide benchmarking of LGBTQ+ staff and student equalities and led, amongst others, to the specific inclusion of the following focus areas: ‘establish and maintain a central page of LGBTQ+ role models at UCL’; ‘develop and rollout central LGBTQ+ allyship training scheme’; and ‘improve promotion of EDI networks to new starters in induction’. As discussed in the earlier section, Simon and Emma have gone the extra mile in beaconing this EDI work by actively engaging the report with UCL’s Institutional Academic and Professional Leadership Team. They have subsequently taken up invitations to workshop the findings and deliver tailored recommendations to Vice Presidents in HR, EDI and VPEE, and the Vice Provost for Education. Emma and Simon have also produced bespoke presentations and supported faculty level LGBTQ+ actions with senior leadership teams in the Institute of Education, Maths and Physical Sciences, The Bartlett, Engineering, Population and Health Sciences, Life Sciences and Medical Sciences. What sets their innovative approach to EDI beaconing apart has been their commitment to direct engagement with stakeholders across UCL, providing information and recommendations relevant for each domain. When presenting to the HR and EDI Leadership teams, they produced a presentation that aligned the findings with the “core values” within the UCL Strategic Plan 2025-2030. Following a conversation with the Vice Provost for Education and Student Experience the new education strategy will now include a focus on LGBTQ+ issues. When presenting to MAPS and Engineering, they focussed on specific issues and recommendations related to STEM disciplines. This nuanced beaconing approach provided each set of stakeholders with the most relevant and actionable information. Attending to the different needs of stakeholders has enabled more immediate impact at local levels. Recognising the specific issues affecting LGBTQ+ staff at the IOE, the Faculty has now committed long term funding for an LGBTQ+ Equity Lead. The disciplinary differences between LGBTQ+ staff in STEM and those in the humanities has led to a more localised study by the Department of Brain Sciences to understand LGBTQ+ staff experiences, which Simon and Emma advised on. An area of expertise and innovation they have developed through this project is how to conduct institutionally focussed research on and with marginalised groups. This area of EDI beaconing has involved them sharing best practice for data generation, sampling, and analysis with Athena Swan and Religion and Belief EDI teams. Simon and Emma have also recognised the need for further research to take place and are in active discussions with UCL senior leadership teams on funding a follow-up study and a student-focussed study. Although the focus of their beaconing has been within UCL, Simon and Emma are committed to sharing their innovative EDI work at UCL with colleagues in other universities. They have formed a working group with other university researchers working on LGBTQ+ experiences in higher education to share UCL best practices across the sector. In the past year, this group have held one workshop and have been invited to present at the QueerEd conference at Anglia Ruskin University. They have presented on the findings at University of Reading, and in May will present at the University of Warwick. They have written a best practice guide for sector professionals in TES Campus+ and have had an academic paper accepted by the Journal of Gender and Education.

4. The Bartlett Promise Team

The Bartlett Promise Team has delivered a sector-leading, faculty-wide initiative that exemplifies beaconing EDI practice and strengthens UCL’s long-term ambition to build a more inclusive future.

Launched in 2020, the Bartlett Promise Scholarship is the largest fully funded scholarship programme at UCL and one of the most ambitious of its kind nationally. Led by a dedicated team working across departments and external partners, the programme embeds diversity, equity and inclusion across the full student lifecycle — from outreach and contextual admissions through to mentoring, community-building and progression into careers.

Key impact and reach include:

• Supporting 132 fully funded scholars across undergraduate, postgraduate and doctoral study
• Expanding globally through Sub-Saharan Africa Master’s scholarships (2024)
• Building a diverse cohort, with 86% from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds, 31% identifying as disabled, and 95% from low-income households

The Bartlett Promise Team’s work extends beyond access to actively shaping inclusive environments in which students can thrive. The programme acts as a catalyst for belonging, connecting outreach, contextual admissions, mentoring, networking and progression support to build a sustained scholarly community.

Alongside programme delivery, the team organise events, mentor and support scholars, secure funding and engage external partners and donors to sustain and grow the initiative. This work goes beyond institutional citizenship, driven by a shared commitment to the potential of those who come to study at the Bartlett.

Through rigorous design, sustained delivery and innovative partnership, the Bartlett Promise Team has created a model of EDI practice that not only transforms individual lives but supports a more inclusive future for UCL and beyond.

The nominees have delivered significant and sustained change across UCL by transforming access, participation and belonging within the Bartlett Faculty. Their work has increased representation of underrepresented groups and embedded inclusive practice across the student lifecycle. Through outreach, mentoring and progression support, they have created a model that strengthens both student experience and long-term access to the built environment professions. Crucially, the programme’s scale and success are influencing practice beyond the faculty, contributing to wider institutional change and supporting UCL’s ambition to build a more diverse and inclusive future.

The nominees have gone beyond their core academic and professional responsibilities through sustained coordination, partnership and delivery across 13 departments and with schools, charities and donors. Alongside programme delivery, they organise events, mentor and support scholars, and actively engage external partners to secure funding and sustain the initiative. They also enable scholars to act as ambassadors, establishing peer-led collectives and initiatives focused on race, disability and representation. This work reflects exceptional commitment and collaboration, driven by a shared belief in the potential of their students and a commitment to widening access.

The nominees have gone the extra mile in beaconing their EDI work by actively sharing a visible, evidence-based model of inclusive practice across UCL and beyond. Delivered alongside their core responsibilities, their work demonstrates a sustained commitment to widening participation and student success. Through partnerships, outreach and engagement with external stakeholders, including donors and sector networks, they promote good practice and extend the programme’s influence. This has increased awareness of effective EDI approaches and influenced how inclusion is embedded in practice, positioning the programme as a leading model for driving inclusive change across the university.