A recently released Employment Systems Review (ESR) lays the foundation for rectifying employment equity issues on The University of Western Ontario campus and serves as the basis for a new action plan.
Rather than ignoring the problem, Alan Weedon, Vice-Provost (Academic Planning, Policy and Faculty), says the university commissioned an ESR to identify employment barriers for members of four designated groups (women, Aboriginal Persons, persons with disabilities, and members of visible minorities).
“If you want to do something about unconscious biases, you raise it to top-of-mind. We are not interested in sweeping anything under the carpet, we want to enable the conversation so that we can develop an action plan,” he says.
Consulting firm Barbara Herring & Associates Inc. conducted the review from January to July. Although the focus groups and interviews with 107 faculty and staff are not comprehensive of the experiences of all employees at Western, it does provide a window into workplace gaps.
The ESR included an assessment of recruitment; selection and hiring; training and development; promotion; retention and termination; and reasonable accommodation for possible barriers. It also provides Western with 33 recommendations for consideration.
With the review now in hand, the President’s Standing Committee on Employment Equity is collecting feedback from the university until the end of the year. In 2010, the committee will be considering these recommendations in the development of an updated Employment Equity Work Plan.
Taking a closer look at some of the observations made in the review, several barriers were noted:
Barriers to women faculty
According to the review, there is under-representation of women among faculty. Some faculties place an emphasis on traditional content and teaching/research approaches, which favour academic areas that tend to appeal to men.
Ten years ago, 30 per cent of assistant professors were women, compared to 40 per cent at other similar institutions, notes Weedon.
“For some reason the proportion of women hired was lower than at other places.”
In many faculties, positions “at the top” are dominated by men. This may have resulted in the hiring practices of those with decision-making power reflecting areas of research and teaching strengths that interest men rather than women, explains Weedon, but adds, “a lot of it is unconscious.”
Many hiring initiatives were implemented over the past seven years to increase the number of women on faculty, raising the number of new women hires to 40 per cent.
Because assistant professor is an entry position, it will take a number of years for them to advance through the ranks and change the professoriate population.
“The initiatives we’ve brought in over the last few years to increase the hiring of women in the professoriate are working,” says Weedon. “It’s just that it will take a long time for them to have an impact on the overall numbers across the entire campus.”
The review also points to a lack of support for faculty members and researchers balancing work and family responsibilities. For example, women on maternity leave are not supported for the work required to keep an active research laboratory. With many women assuming a primary role in child-rearing, “the structure of the disciplines is really biased against their career progress,” says Weedon.
Helping to address family needs through accommodation has been informally instituted by faculties, rather than implemented as a university-wide policy, he adds.
Barriers to staff (Aboriginal Persons, persons with disabilities and members of visible minorities)
These groups are under represented in professional and managerial positions. Part of this, according to the review, is the lack of external hiring for jobs, which are primarily covered by the Professional and Managerial Association.
Western’s online job application system is cited as “atypical” because it doesn’t allow for a cover letter and resume to be submitted as one document; the advertisements of jobs on Western’s website can go undetected by those unfamiliar with this recruitment channel; and there is limited outreach to encourage applications from these designated groups.
This are all said to be among the barriers to filling these gaps.
Western may have been successful in turning the page on its reputation as a party school, but it has yet to shake off a negative reputation as an employer in the minds of some.
The review notes past negative experiences of Aboriginal Peoples employed at the university may be preventing some job seekers from applying to Western. Changes have been made to make the university a more welcoming environment, however Weedon says the challenge is getting the word out.
“We need to find a way to explain that to people so they don’t continue to think that they shouldn’t come to Western because it wouldn’t be welcoming.”
Moving forward
Having had the Chilly Climate report and video, as well as the subsequent Voices of Diversity video released last year pointing to issues of equity on campus, Weedon says he was not surprised by the results of the review.
“For me there weren’t many surprises in here,” he says. “The purpose of holding the review is to give us some basis for deciding how to act. We asked for the review – we commissioned it – and the purpose was to get some advice on what we need to do.
“I think we are doing a lot better than we were, but we can’t be complacent. We have to do the best we can.”
Similarly, Larissa Bartlett, director of Equity & Human Rights Services, says the review gives Western insight into the “pulse” of the university. The recommendations offer advice for best practices and marry this with the experiences shared during the interviews.
It has been about seven years since Western’s last review and this provides a solid basis moving forward to revisit the university’s employment equity plan, she notes.
The university has made great strides to improve employment equity and a list of these accomplishments is available on the Equity & Human Rights Services website.
“Western hasn’t been sitting back on its laurels doing nothing,” says Bartlett. “Every day there are people on this campus who are focused on good employment equity practices.”
The complete review, including the 33 recommendations, can be viewed at https://www.uwo.ca/equity/esr.htm Those interested in providing feedback on the review can also do this through the website.
In an attempt to identify employment barriers to four designated groups at Western (women, Aboriginal persons, persons with disabilities and members of visible minorities, a recently completed Employment Systems Review has provided 33 recommendations for consideration.
To view the report visit uwo.ca/equity/esr.htm.
