Gender and Sexuality. The College is committed to eradicating negative discrimination, harassment and bullying on the grounds of a person’s sexuality or gender. We became the first college in Scotland to achieve the Silver LGBT+ Charter of Rights, awarded by LGBT Youth in September 2017. In 2018, Borders College Students’ Association (BCSA) played a prominent role in arranging transgender awareness training for staff in order to raise awareness and understanding. BCSA has also developed a new activism-focused student LGBT group called ‘Stand Out!’ whose purpose is to organise equalities-related events and campaigns and awareness raising activities. The College recognises that it has a significant part to play in shaping people’s aspirations and in challenging gender stereotypes in relation to career choices. We published our institutional Gender Action Plan (iGAP) in summer 2017 which is due for review in Summer 2019. The iGAP also aims to ensure that marketing avoids gender bias, challenges gender stereotypes and that our services are cognisant of both transgender and non-binary gender issues. We will seek to maintain the proportion of males involved in education and training at the College at parity with females. The target for 2019/20 is to reduce to 75% the number of full time programmes with one gender making up more than 75% of enrolments. Key areas addressed through the iGAP are hairdressing, childcare, construction and engineering, through for example, work in schools and publicity materials. We will continue to carry out targeted events to the Senior Phase such as Girls into construction and Males into Care. This target reduces to 70% by 2020/21. We will update the iGAP annually. The College will monitor all programmes by learner success and gender from 2018/19 onwards and will look to take necessary action from 2019/20 onwards where specific issues have been identified with particular programmes. Outputs for 2019/20
Gender and Sexuality. The College is committed to eradicating negative discrimination, harassment and bullying on the grounds of a person’s sexuality or gender. It became the first college in Scotland to achieve the Silver LGBT+ Charter of Rights which was awarded by LGBT Youth in September 2017. It has had a particular focus on providing training to its entire staff in transgender issues, raising awareness and understanding. The College recognises that it has a significant part to play in shaping people’s aspirations and in challenging gender stereotypes in relation to career choices. It published its Gender Action Plan in summer 2017 to ensure, among other things, that gender equality issues are addressed in its Developing the Young Workforce plans. The Plan also aims to ensure that marketing avoids gender bias, challenges gender stereotypes and that the College’s services are cognisant of both transgender and non-binary gender issues. We will look to gradually increase the proportion of males involved in education and training at the College to parity with females by 2020/21. The target for 2018/19 is to reduce to 70% the number of full time programmes with one gender making up more than 75% of enrolments. This target reduces to 68% by 2020/21. The Gender Action Plan will be updated annually at the end of the academic year. The College will monitor all programmes by learner success and gender from 2018/19 onwards and will look to take necessary action from 2019/20 onwards where specific issues have been identified with particular programmes. Outputs for 2018/19
