The university was extremely proud to hear the results of this year’s index coming 82nd on the list, maintaining our Top 100 position of last year.
Our LGBT+ Staff Network also won the ‘Network of the Year’ award, an amazing achievement.
To find out more see this university news article.
New guidelines from Girlguiding state that transgender children and leaders are welcome in the organisation in a move to support anyone who identifies as a girl or woman.
The 107-year-old organisation now officially opens its doors to those who were assigned male at birth but self-identify as female.
The guidelines state that children from the age of five can join Rainbows, Brownies and Girl Guides if they identify as female.
Dating app Tinder has launched a new feature that will allow users to add information about their gender.
Until now, members were offered only two options when selecting their identity – man or woman.
The app was criticised earlier in the year after a number of people from the transgender community claimed their accounts were suspended after complaints from other users.
Tinder says it’s now decided to make the app more inclusive. More
During November Transgender Awareness Week takes place week beginning the 14th and finishes with Transgender Day of Remembrance on the 20th. With this in mind we have chosen Riley Carter Millington as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.
Riley is an actor known for playing Kyle Slater in EastEnders. He is the first transgender man to play a regular transgender character in British soap history.
Riley is from Manchester and studied drama at Eccles Sixth Form Centre and on the BA (Hons) Acting at the University of Lancashire before being cast in EastEnders. His character, Kyle, is also transgender. His casting was praised by presenter Paris Lees as “the biggest thing to happen for the transgender community in Britain this decade. … As a pop culture moment this is massive and a sign of the times.”
In 2015 Riley was voted no 1 in The Independent Newspaper’s Rainbow List – their annual celebration of influential lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people in Britain, the first transgender man to top the list. The judges believed that by being open about who he is and appearing in one of Britain’s most-watched television shows, he would transform lives.
Riley is currently starring in SAFE a new production at the London Theatre Workshop addressing the big issue of homelessness among LGBT youth.
To find out more about Transgender Awareness Week and Transgender Day of Remembrance see here https://www.glaad.org/transweek
The NHS is failing to meet the needs of transgender adults and children, says a nurse who has first-hand experience both working in a hospital and as a transgender patient.
Kirsty Cass, 53, works at a private hospital in southern England. But in 2012, she was an NHS patient having gender reassignment surgery.
When she woke up from her operation, she remembers a member of staff on the ward referring to her as “he”.
This year Diversity Week takes place during the week beginning 14 March 2016 in collaboration with the Students’ Union, GK Unions and Health and Wellbeing. The week will include activities and exhibitions with a theme of ‘In Someone Else’s Shoes’. Everyone is welcome to come along and we look forward to seeing you.
14th March Greenwich, The Undercroft Stalls and Activities (including Wellbeing Week) 10.30am – 2.30pm
14th March Queen Anne 165 ‘Football: Tackling discrimination’ workshop with Kick It Out 4.00pm – onwards
14th March Queen Anne 080 LGBT+ Rights in the Commonwealth 5.30pm – 7.30pm
16th March Medway Campus, Pilkington Hall/Atrium Diversity Fair/World Café/Stalls (including Wellbeing Week) 10.30am – 2.00pm
18th March Avery Hill Campus, The Dome Stalls and Activities (including Wellbeing Week) 10.30am – 2.00pm
19th March David Fussy Sports Hall Kick It Out – FREE Five-a-Side Football 12.00pm – 2.00pm
14th – 20th March #takeastand week is part of BUCS’ Take a Stand campaign #teamgreenwich
14th – 18th March Equality Facebook Campaign #Equality
14th – 18th March Rainbow Laces Campaigns
February is LGBT History Month and with this in mind we have chosen Paris Lees as our Inspirational Diversity Champion of the Month.
Paris is a British journalist, presenter and transgender rights activist. Paris was brought up as a boy, and self-identified as gay in early adulthood. At the age of 18 she committed a robbery, for which she served eight months in prison. While in prison she decided to change: “I just thought, ‘I’m this silly teenage boy in a prison cell who has made a huge mistake and I want to be this happy person’.” She moved to Brighton to study English at university, where she started to identify as female: “In the space of six weeks I went from living in Nottingham as a boy with my grandma still alive, to living in Brighton as a girl”. She was referred to Charing Cross Gender Identity Clinic where she received hormone treatment to begin gender transition.
Paris founded the first British magazine aimed at the trans community, META and was the acting assistant editor of Gay Times. She also has columns in both Gay Times and Diva and was the first trans cover girl for Diva. She has also written for many mainstream newspapers and magazines, as well as for Channel 4 News.
She has presented on both television and radio, being the first trans woman presenter on both BBC Radio 1 and Channel 4. On Radio 1, she produced a documentary entitled “The Hate Debate” which covered the attitudes people have to minority groups and covered issues related to racism, homophobia, transphobia and Islamophobia. The Hate Debate was followed up with a second documentary in the same slot, “My Transgender Punk Rock Story”, interviewing transgender rock star Laura Jane Grace and introducing the teenage audience to trans concepts of identity both within and outside of the binary. She also presented the episode “Trans” of Channel 4’s The Shooting Gallery.
On 25 October 2013 Paris took part as a panelist in the BBC’s 100 Women event and in October 2013 she became the first openly transgender panelist to appear on the BBC’s Question Time programme.
Paris has worked with Trans Media Watch which challenged Channel 4 to remove transphobic material from its broadcasts, and consulted with the channel for its documentary My Transsexual Summer.
She currently works with All About Trans, a project that tries to bring together journalists and other media professionals with transgender people.
In 2013, she topped The Independent on Sunday’s Pink List, naming her as the most influential lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender figure in the UK; and was awarded the Positive Role Model Award for LGBT in the 2012.
The first EDI Strategy launch was held on 27 January 2016. The event was a huge success attracting nearly 90 participants throughout the day, including colleagues, not only from university faculties and directorates but also from Cambridge University, Goldsmiths and Business in the Community.
We welcomed many speakers who had come to us from Stonewall, King’s College London, Kingston University, the Students Union, and many other from the university. The speakers on the day talked on a wide range of topics including, Stonewall Workplace Equality Index, Athena SWAN, Race Equality Charter, Student Parents, Disability, religion and belief, mental health, BME.
Our participants really enjoyed the day and we thank them for attending and our speakers for taking part.
The university has been ranked as one of the UK’s most gay-friendly workplaces in Stonewall Top 100 Employers, published today.
Greenwich is placed at 80th in this list of the nation’s best-performing employers, drawn from Stonewall’s Workplace Equality Index 2016, an annual audit of workplace culture for lesbian, gay, bi and trans staff. More
