ESU launches its equity training

ESU is embarking on a series of equity training sessions for member unions, as part of a major project to increase awareness of, and action on, equity issues within the context of higher education.    Taking place in the Romanian city of Timisoara from 6-8th March, the training will provide 50-60 representatives from ESU’s member NUSes in the south and east of Europe with high quality professional training to enable them to both achieve greater equity and to combat discrimination more effectively.  Representatives from countries as diverse as Albania, Belarus and Israel will be invited to attend, with subsidised participation fees and travel to enable unions to attend.

The Romania training session will be followed by two complementary events:  Tallinn, Estonia from 2-4th April for member NUSes from the north of Europe, and Austria from 12-14th June for countries in central and south west Europe.

Equity is one of ESU’s current top work priorities, with research showing that vast inequities remain in higher education in terms of unequal access to, and participation in HE, and discrimination during courses of study.  The training sessions are just one part of a Commission-funded project, ‘Equity in Higher Education from a Student Perspective’ which has been running since October 2007 and will end in September this year.  Other outputs from the project have already included a research project, a student conference on equity in higher education (Slovakia, May 2008), a handbook for student representatives and an online training and information platform.