Oldham and Hopwood Hall College Positive Action Consultancy

	Discussions and interviews
	Literature review

The main conclusions of the project are:

	Carry out voluntary minority ethnic monitoring to identify blockages in recruitment and promotion procedures.
	Introduce into the induction system programme elements that ensure staff and governors are fully aware and trained in understanding and challenging racism.
	Integrate equality into quality assurance.
	Improve transparency around promotions and appointments.
	Introduce a broader curriculum (e.g. multi-racial hairdressing/healthcare course where the specification require that the programme leader has skills in Asian and African-Caribbean hairdressing and healthcare) to create more scope for black and ethnic minority people to join ranks at all levels.
	Introduce professional mentoring schemes.
	Introduce secondments internally across departments/sections and externally to offer opportunities for on the job training in higher levels of work to black and minority ethnic staff.
	Involve the responsible person for quality and equality in the recruitment and selection process and in staff development and planning.
	Ensure that the college committees/boards/panels are representative of people from under-represented groups. Establish a selection and recruitment panel responsible for: Vetting all job descriptions and job specifications for bias. Challenging unwritten assumptions in the person specifications. Advising on the most suitable place to advertise to reach specific groups. Developing an in-house job-seeker pack which deals with completion of application forms, how to write job specifications, constructing CVs for the advertised post and the college. Developing a professional monitoring system.

Recommendations

Carry out voluntary minority ethnic monitoring to identify blockages in recruitment and promotion procedures and establish a selection and recruitment panel.

Publication- Restricted. Contact: Andy Forbes, Director for Widening Participation, The Oldham College, Rochdale Road, Oldham OL9 6AA