School of Infection & Immunity

We are delighted to share the news that the School of Infection & Immunity's Professor Nicola Veitch and Dr Leighann Sherry alongside Dr Victoria Paterson and Dr Stewart White (both SBOHVM) have been awarded the inaugural Microbiology Society Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) prize.

The team have been recognised for their fantastic work embedding Equality, Diversity and Inclusion into biosciences undergraduate curricula through staff-student partnerships.

Together they developed two strategies to embed novel EDI resources into Life Sciences undergraduate courses, making the curriculum more inclusive and empowering for students.

These resources were developed and piloted at the University of Glasgow but are suitable for use in a wide variety of higher education settings and are freely available online. 

EDI educational materials were built around the nine protected characteristics embedded in the Equality Act, 2010. This includes Problem Based Learning sessions examining authentic case studies of individuals facing barriers related to EDI issues such as race, gender, sexual orientation and disability, role model interviews and a bespoke, innovative Equality and Diversity in the Life Sciences mobile app.

This project also acknowledged the need to decolonise the curriculum and is embedding material into programmes, addressing the history of how discipline knowledge has been derived and injustices encountered along the way.

Microbiology final-year project students worked to decolonise their own curriculum and develop resources, including case study material for tutorials and class discussion, authorship analysis and glossaries of diverse scientists representing historically marginalised groups. 

The staff-student partnerships were critical in the success of this work, ensuring that students views and opinions are taken into account in curriculum design and to support student development. The student interns were: Annamaria Szaboova, Sonya Frazier, Holly Kerr, Jack Knowles, Declan Prosser, Lara Ryan, Jie Min, Ashley Shaji, Lauren Dunhill and Sri Lalitha Sista. The project students were Lidia Errico and Zara Gatt.

Additionally, the importance of this work is now being recognised beyond Glasgow and could potentially lead sector-wide change in inclusive teaching and learning.

Professor Veitch said: “We are all thrilled to be part of the team receiving the Microbiology Society EDI prize, recognising our commitment to embedding EDI into our Life Science curriculum.

"We strive to make our teaching practices inclusive and have been developing new resources around this in relation to decolonising the curriculum in collaboration with undergraduate and postgraduate students for many years.

"The prize is excellent recognition for the hard work put in by students, who generated many of the resources, working alongside University of Glasgow staff. 

"We would also like to acknowledge the funding from The Wellcome Trust and University of Glasgow Learning and Teaching Fund, without which the project would not have been possible.”

Head of Sii Professor Julia Edgar added: “The receipt of this award from the Microbiology Society is testament to the efforts of the winners to bring equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) into the biosciences undergraduate curricula, and evidence of the success of their approach.

"The staff-student partnership the winners developed is particularly noteworthy as it made certain our students’ views were heard and provided a forum for them to explore these important issues in the context of scientific research.

"I add my own congratulations to Nicola, Leighann, Victoria and Stewart and wish them further success in their endeavours.”

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First published: 7 November 2024