Meet Beverley Harry, the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Manager for GLAM
Beverley is developing a strategy and implementation plan for GLAM which will provide a framework for increasing equality, diversity and inclusion across the gardens and museums. Beverley shared how she came to work for the University and what she hopes the impact of her work will be for the future.
Why is this work important to me? Well, it should be important to everyone.
Beverley Harry (She/Her)
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Manager for GLAM
Tell us what brought you to equality and inclusion at the University.
“I've been teaching for 22 years, and in that time, I taught sociology, politics, and psychology. The things I taught about the best were those issues of inequality, particularly in sociology; we talked about race, class, gender, and we looked at those particular areas within society. I became this unofficial spokesperson for inequalities at some point. My classroom was like a youth club, with people coming to talk about some of these issues, so I took them to the school and said we need to have these conversations with the young people.
“As time went on, I started doing some training within the school and I started writing programmes, even doing training for staff, but it just didn't ever go anywhere. And then, three people sent me the same job and said you need to apply for this, and that is how I ended up at the University doing EDI work.”
What are you working on here at the University?
“I work in GLAM, which means I support the Gardens, Libraries and Museums. I'm developing an equality diversity and inclusion strategic plan. Off the back of a specially commissioned report which examined the opportunities to increase diversity in our audiences, collections and in our workplace, I did some research with people that manage groups and teams across GLAM. I asked number of questions that linked to the report, to find out whether teams were making the things recommended in the report happen. I'm now developing a plan based on what the departments said they need support with.
“The implementation plan is going to be based around the Ashmolean. We’ll be guinea pigs for it. We’re thinking, if it works at the Ashmolean, it might work everywhere else. That’s not to say, other departments must follow the same plan. We will work with departments to make more bespoke plans for them.”
Tell us something you love about working for GLAM
“What I love about the gardens in particular, is that I've forgotten how beautiful they are. When I went to a meeting at the botanical gardens recently, I suddenly thought, my gosh I haven't had been here for years. After the meeting I spent probably two and a half hours walking around the gardens and talking to the staff. They were telling me all these stories about how long they've been there their favourite flowers. I just thought, I need to come here more often.
What has surprised you about working at Oxford?
“Even though I'm doing EDI work, I'm surprised at how diverse particular areas can be [at the University]. I'm not surprised about its general make, up but I'm surprised that there are more people that look like me than I thought would be here, that is for sure. And by how many people want to support the EDI Journey.
Why is the EDI work you're doing here important to you?
“Why is this work important to me? Well, it should be important to everyone to be fair. Being at Oxford University is important to me. I come from the wider part of Oxford, I grew up in Oxford and I know that people see Oxford as this old institution, that doesn't want to move, and doesn't want to diversify, and isn't interested in me because of my neurodiversity, or my disability, or my ethnic background. I'm trying to support in changing that.
“Because I come from a wider Oxford community, the university has this image of being quite stuffy and people like me don't come here. Lots of people I know think, I'm not going to apply to work here because of my disability or my neurodiversity. The reality is that the University is doing a lot of things to broaden that, and I'd like to be part of that spreading that message.”
What do I want in the future?
“I'd like to get the strategies in play for everybody, so that each department can see, well this is where we are today, this is where we were yesterday, and we can then start to measure some of the things that we're doing. I'd like to have a role in some of those things that people do.
“My job actually is for two years, and I'm already six months in. I cannot believe I'm six months in! If my job continues, absolutely fine, I'd love it. But if not, I'd like to leave a legacy of some of the things departments have done as part of their plans and feel that I made some sort of difference.”
