Ethnicity and race

We believe that academic excellence and diversity go hand in hand. We actively work to ensure students and staff of all ethnic and racial backgrounds feel valued, represented, and supported.

Race Equality Pledges  

After an extensive consultation exercise with colleagues and students, UCL Laws published its Dean’s Race Equality Pledges for 2020-2021 in December 2020. The purpose of these annual commitments is to advance race equality objectives for Black, Asian and racially minoritised applicants, students and colleagues in the Faculty. 

Strategic objectives for the Faculty include widening participation and a sense of belonging for racially minoritised students; promoting the recruitment and career progression of racially minoritised academic and professional services colleagues; and diversifying the UCL Laws’ curriculum. With these objectives in mind, the Faculty has committed to take the following five actions in 2020-21:

  1. Permanently embed Laws’ Perspectives Workshops in the Faculty which engage with legal topics from marginalised perspectives including race and issues of intersectionality and continue to promote inclusivity on all modules, liaising with the UCL Liberating the Curriculum initiative and Student Curriculum Partners;
  2. Use where feasible ethnically diverse advisory panels in all Faculty promotion processes;
  3. Promote more ethnically diverse speakers and panels at Faculty events;
  4. Review LLB admissions processes in order to encourage and support more successful applications from racially minoritised students; 
  5. Investigate causes of historic Awarding Gap for racially minoritised students in Laws and explore appropriate responses.

UCL Laws Race Equality Network  

In 2019, the Faculty established a new UCL Laws Race Equality Network for students, staff, and alumni. The purpose of the Network is to support Laws’ staff and students from racially minoritised backgrounds, and to help break down barriers to equality of opportunity that have traditionally held back racial minorities in academia and the legal profession more generally. Regular events will be planned of both a social, academic and careers-based nature to raise the profile of race equality in the legal sector and to promote a sense of inclusion and belonging for these groups within the Faculty.  

We are very keen to involve alumni - from whatever ethnic background - in the development of the Network and are keen in particular to speak to alumni who may have set up similar networks in their own workplaces or who might be willing to act as mentors or advisors to our racially minoritised students. If you would like to join our mailing list or feel that you might have the time to help by providing mentoring opportunities to our students or by speaking at an event, we would be delighted to hear from you. Please, in the first instance, contact Dr Orla Lynskey  (Vice Dean for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion). 

UCL Laws Race Equality Network events  

 

Watch Black Lives Matter - A Transatlantic Dialogue on YouTube.
In this event sponsored by the UCL Laws Race Equality Network, two leading scholars on the law and the politics of race in the US and UK will open up a transatlantic dialogue attempting to address these and other questions about the context, relevance and global implications of the Black Lives Matter movement.

    UCL Laws Statement in Solidarity with our Black Students, Staff and Alumni Around the World  

    Read our statement in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.