The Athena SWAN Charter recognises commitment to advancing women's careers in science, technology, maths and medicine (STEMM) employment in higher education.

Having held a Bronze award since 2014, the School was awarded a Silver award in May 2018. The Silver award recognises that the School has taken action in response to previously identified challenges and has demonstrated the impact of the actions implemented.

School of Mathematics Silver Application (PDF, 2,550kB)

Athena SWAN is relevant to everyone, not just women in science. Implementing a successful Athena SWAN application requires buy-in from everyone in the School at every stage of the career structure, irrespective of gender or background, for the following reasons:

• To address gender inequalities requires commitment and action from everyone, at all levels of the organisation.
• To tackle the unequal representation of women in science requires changing cultures and attitudes across the organisation.
• The absence of diversity at management and policy-making levels has broad implications.

Although Athena SWAN explicitly addresses the problems facing women, all actions put in place to improve equality and working environment will benefit everyone, especially men who take a role in family life. The key is to change the social norms so that everyone can enjoy equal opportunities and a fulfilling, fair working environment.