Essex has won a Bronze Athena SWAN Charter award.

Essex has been honoured for its commitment to help advance women’s careers in STEMM subjects (science, technology, engineering, maths and medicine).

Essex has been successful in gaining a Bronze university award in the Athena SWAN Charter awards, which recognises commitment to advancing women’s careers in STEMM academia. The honour is in recognition that Essex, across the whole institution, has a solid foundation for eliminating gender bias and developing an inclusive culture that values all staff.

Vice-Chancellor, Professor Anthony Forster, said: “We are delighted that our commitment to achieving a significant improvement in women’s representation and career progression in STEMM subjects has been recognised. This is an important step for the University and we are keen to build on the momentum gained by achieving this award. We will be working to identify and address challenges faced by particular disciplines within STEMM subjects and we are also participating in the Equality Challenge Unit’s Gender Charter Mark trial which extends the principles of Athena SWAN to the arts, humanities and social sciences.

“I am personally committed to improving the gender balance across the University and see equality and diversity as a mainstream, essential activity of this University. It is what the University stands for in providing a fair and open environment for staff and students.”

Having achieved this award, the next step is for individual departments/schools within the Faculty of Science and Health to apply for their own awards in recognition of the specific work they are doing to promote gender equality and address challenges particular to their discipline.

To qualify for the award, the University had to demonstrate that it had a solid foundation for eliminating gender bias and developing an inclusive culture that values all staff. The University then had to develop an action plan to promote gender equality.