We believe that diversity, of people, culture, and thought, is the cornerstone of an inspiring and impactful university environment. We are proud of our diverse student communities and are committed to ensuring an inclusive and supportive environment for everyone.

Over the last couple of years, we have been working to enhance to student experience through developing guidance, policies and teams dedicated to equality and inclusion.

Find out more about how we’ve been doing this.

Enhanced Parent and Carer Support 

Following feedback from our community, we made improvements to better support student parents and carers and make our guidance clearer and easier to understand. We launched a revised Student Parent and Carer Support package in October 2023, which includes updates to our Children on Site Policy, additional nursing facilities at our sites, and clearer guidance for setting up a Parenthood and Caring Support Agreement (PCSA) with Student Services.

Quiet Spaces for all 

We recognise the importance of providing safe and comfortable spaces for students, staff and visitors to use for purposes such as prayer, personal reflection or wellbeing requirements. This year, we made improvements to our ‘Quiet Spaces’, adding more spaces and expanding usage guidelines. You can now find 3 types of Quiet Space at our sites, Multi-faith Room, Wellbeing Room, Multi-faith and Wellbeing Room.

Everyone can make use of the facilities and we are pleased to say that every College has at least 1 Quiet Space available. Find out more about using Quiet Spaces and where to find them.

Trans and non-binary inclusion guidance 

In March 2023, we published new guidance to enable our trans and non-binary students to seek support from UAL. This guidance was also created to help our staff to better support trans and non-binary students. The guidance includes information on topics including changing records, confidentiality and disclosure, practical support, and dealing with bullying and harassment. Find out more on our Supporting Trans and Non-Binary Students web page.

Free period products 

A great example of how positive change can come from student campaigning, is the introduction of free period products at all our sites.

The idea was originally conceived by Student Changemakers at Central Saint Martins (CSM), and following the backing of Chief Social Purpose Officer Polly Mackenzie, the project was expanded to include all UAL sites. To make this a reality, UAL worked closely with Arts SU and Student Changemakers, ensuring that key stakeholders were able to input into the project and students’ needs were met.

The resulting change supports students with the cost of living and contributes to ending period poverty at UAL. Discover where you can find dispensers.

Celebrating Religious Festivals and Awareness Days 

Celebrating Religious Festivals and Awareness Days is an important way to ensure our entire community feels welcome at UAL. It can also be a chance to acknowledge the changes that are still needed and how we can collectively make positive steps towards a more inclusive and diverse university.

To help our community be aware of all the celebrations throughout the year, we have updated UAL’s Religious and Cultural Observances Calendar for 2023/24. The calendar lists a selection of holidays, festivals and cultural observances that reflect many of the religions and beliefs practiced by our diverse UAL community. The calendar is available for staff and students to add to their own Outlook calendars.

Changing Places toilet facilities 

In July 2023 UAL became the second London University to introduce Changing Places facilities on campus. Standard accessible toilets meet the needs for many disabled people, but not all. The additional facilities and larger space available in a Changing Places toilet (CPT) provide better support for people who use large complex equipment or require assistance from others to change clothing or continence pads with privacy and dignity.

As of January 2024, we now have CPTs at Wimbledon College of Arts and London College of Fashion. We are working on adding more CPTs to the rest of our sites.

Raising money for the Hardship Fund through the staff survey

In 2023, UAL pledged to donate £2 to the Student Hardship Fund, which supports students with family income below £50k, for every colleague who completed the annual staff survey. As well as incentivising staff to give valuable feedback which will help us to make improvements to working at UAL, we raised an impressive £6,502 for the Hardship Fund.