Gender equality perspective

A gender equality perspective is integrated in the programme's design and teaching/learning activities.

Some research fields at the higher education institution, such as Building Design or Healthcare Architecture, more or less determine the gender balance with the majority of the doctoral students. In other research fields, the gender balance is more even. In addition, there is a gender imbalance in the staff, with more male than female supervisors. According to the self-evaluation, when recruiting new doctoral students, gender balance is always an issue.

According to interviews with the staff, paying attention to gender issues in the teaching content is a work in progress, as is the promotion of diversity in general. It is important to ensure that every member feels free to express their ideas in meetings. However, in the self-evaluation there is a striking statement recorded in a student survey in the Department of Architecture, in which the following pattern is highlighted; while the majority of doctoral student presentations are made by women, the discussion at meetings is normally dominated by men and the majority of professors are men.

The assessment panel notes that working in isolation or in small groups potentially leads to disjunction and non-awareness of gender issues. A certain size of the research groups as well as the exchange and sharing of supervision (e.g., with other schools via the ResArc network) could counteract such tendencies. Or, as it was stated by staff in the interviews, the focus needs to be moved from equal numbers to actual diverse qualities, which is an ongoing process.

Systematic follow-up is performed to ensure that the programme's design and teaching/learning activities promote gender equality. The results of the follow-up are translated, when necessary, into actions for quality improvement, and feedback is given to relevant stakeholders.

The annual employee survey includes issues regarding the psychosocial and physical work environment. Because the responses can be divided by gender and type of employment, the survey can be used to follow up gender equality. Although there are already efforts to improve the current situation regarding gender imbalance, a more coherent policy is needed in the future. The higher education institution is working on such a policy to be implemented in all operations in 2019. The panel wants to emphasise that the policy explicitly needs to address the content of third-cycle programmes, staff and doctoral student recruitment, support for funding applications, and – as already indicated in the self-evaluation – a new attitude of listening from a gender perspective in everyday life.

The assessment panel emphasises the overall awareness of gender issues and the will to improve, for example, by formulating a clear policy.

In the overall assessment, the gender equality perspective is deemed to be satisfactory.