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To achieve global excellence in research and innovation, the research workforce must bring a diversity of experiences, expertise and ideas which necessitates the creation of inclusive research cultures to remove barriers for marginalised researchers in order to meet UKRI’s UK-wide talent programme and research concordats on responsible research practices. Our vision for the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Caucus (EDICa) is to create inclusive research cultures enabling diverse researchers to access and thrive in careers across the research and innovation (R&I) systems, removing barriers to full participation experienced by women, disabled, LGBTQI and racially minoritized researchers, and researchers with caring responsibilities. EDICa will act as a focal point, identifying, evaluating and synthesising EDI initiatives across the R&I systems ensuring research addresses the needs of a diverse range of stakeholders.
Funded by UKRI and the British Academy, EDICa is a national project which aims to bring an intersectional perspective to the multiple disadvantages which can face marginalised researchers and innovators. The Caucus will use a co-design approach led by those with lived experience of exclusion and marginalisation to undertake and evaluate interventions designed to create equitable workplaces across the research and innovation ecosystems. The Caucus leadership is itself an interdisciplinary team bringing lived experiences of marginalisation across the research and innovation ecosystems including racialised inequalities, disability, neurodiversity, LGBTQI and gendered inequalities. Each member of the team is committed to the removal of barriers to equity in the workplace generally and specifically for those pursuing careers in research and innovation.
https://www.ukri.org/news/ukri-and-the-british-academy-fund-edi-network-to-boost-ri-in-uk/
Review our Research Themes here and our Year 1 activities here.
EDICa’s Objectives
1. To synthesise extant evidence (including peer reviewed literature, grey literature, data from funders) to identify gaps in the evidence, and to develop insights and recommendations for key stakeholders (including the funders) on EDI practice and policy.
2. To conduct a programme of co-designed research which aims to advance the EDI literacy of key stakeholders, co-create enabling research workspaces and advance understanding of the gendered aspects of disability in research careers (specifically problematic menstruation and perimenopause).
3. To commission, via a flexible fund, research and impact projects which create a step-change in EDI across the research & innovation systems.
4. To create, via stakeholder engagement groups, communities of practice, highly skilled in EDI practice.
5. To undertake a co-designed multimedia and multimethods approach to disseminating EDI in research and innovation evidence, best practice, profiles of successful researchers (and their research) and case studies via a robust programme of community engagement activities, culminating in the production of an interactive web-tool Equity in Research and Innovation Careers (ERICa).
in British Sign Language and its 3 objectives. When watched in YouTube, the description under the video contains a translation in English.