Diversity, Pedagogy and the Creative Arts: perceptions and experiences of diverse students at UAL

Part of Research fortnight, this seminar presentation considers teacher diversity at a large creative arts university from the student perspective. It explores findings from a small-scale research study that asked students what impact greater staff diversity would make to their learning and university experiences, and how this might affect their aspirations to enter teaching as a career.

The study used Critical Race Theory, Whiteness and cultural capital frameworks to understand how institutional practices might support or hinder students returning to the academy as staff. This seminar focuses on the students’ narratives in particular in order to consider how teaching approaches, staff-student relationships and the curriculum can support the student journey and go some way to remediating the current lack of BAME staff in HE. Despite difficult encounters, the findings present an overwhelming interest in teaching as a future career.