The University has held a university Bronze award since 2006, which was most recently renewed in 2018.

We hold 21 departmental and school awards including three Gold and four Silver awards.

We are now preparing to apply for a Silver award. As part of the submission process, we will be conducting an Athena Swan University Staff Culture Survey.

The survey will include questions which have been designed by AdvanceHE Athena Swan around six themes: Belonging and Inclusion, Gender Equality, Work-life Balance, Bullying and Harassment, Career Development and Wellbeing.

The survey will cover areas in which we expect to be able to demonstrate that progress in our Gender Equality culture has been achieved due to the completion of our Athena Swan action plan 2018-2024.

This will provide evidence of progress that we need to have made since 2018 in order to achieve our Silver Athena Swan award.

We are asking staff for their commitment to helping us achieve a robust response to the survey which will provide data to enrich our teaching, learning and working environment in the future.

The survey will also provide evidence to support decisions with regard to establishing our priorities for our gender equality work moving forward and will inform our next Athena Swan action plan for 2025-2030. 

The survey will also give us valuable insights to help inform our broader equality, diversity and inclusion agenda. 

As well as helping us evaluate progress on our university-level gender equality commitments, survey data will also be available for departments to use for their local Athena Swan assessments and applications.

You will help to shape the future of the University and influence the things that matter to you. The survey is voluntary, but we would like as many people as possible to take part. The higher the response rate, the more representative and meaningful the results will be.

The survey is your opportunity to tell us what YOU think about our Athena Swan commitments – whatever you have to say, positive or negative, we want to hear it. If you do not complete the survey your views will not be represented.

The survey will be sent to all University employees (including those on fixed-term contracts) who started work on or before 25 September 2023. If you started employment with the University after that date you will not be invited to take part this time but will be invited to take part in the next survey. 

Hull York Medical School (HYMS) staff employed by the University of York, including those who are embedded in a York academic department, will be invited to complete the survey as a member of HYMS. Unfortunately, HYMS staff employed by the University of Hull will not be able to complete the survey at this time.

If you are absent from work when the survey is live (due to maternity leave or long-term sickness absence for example) you will still receive the survey link to your UoY email. If you wish to complete the survey, please do so.

Some staff such as honorary staff, temps, casual workers and employees of subsidiary companies will not be asked to take part – this is because many of the survey questions touch on aspects of working at the University which may not be wholly relevant or applicable.

If you believe you are eligible and have not received the survey link by email from Hive, please check your spam folder. 

We are conducting an Athena Swan University Staff Culture Survey which includes questions designed by AdvanceHE Athena Swan around six themes: Belonging and Inclusion, Gender Equality, Work-life Balance, Bullying and Harassment, Career Development and Wellbeing. The survey will cover areas in which we expect to be able to demonstrate that progress in our Gender Equality culture has been achieved due to the completion of our Athena Swan action plan 2018-2024. This will provide evidence of progress that we need to have made since 2018 in order to achieve our Silver Athena Swan award.

The survey presents a number of statements and asks you to tick a response from the options given. There will be a sliding scale of 0-10 from Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree. You will also be able to answer Not applicable or Prefer not to say. 

Your survey will be prepopulated with the department you worked in as of Monday 25 September. This information is used to analyse and understand how experiences in and views of different departments/sections differ and will allow us to provide results for departments to inform departmental and school gender equality and Athena Swan work.

Please note that departmental-specific results will not be made available for departments or sections with fewer than 10 respondents in order to maintain the confidentiality and anonymity of all respondents.

Please respond in relation to your home department.

Please respond based on the department you were in as of Monday 25 September 2023 – this is where you will have been included in the headcount. If you moved after this date, please respond based on your previous department.

You will have between Thursday 12 October and Friday 3 November to complete the survey.

Typically around 15-20 minutes. The questions involve ticking a box to demonstrate your view. The time taken will depend on how long you think about your responses. Everyone will be given time to complete the survey during their normal working day.

Most questions will be relevant to most members of staff at the University. However, if you really do not think a question is relevant for you then please leave it blank or select 'Not applicable'. Choosing the ‘Neither agree nor disagree’ option shares your view that you do not agree or disagree – it does not say that you have no view on this particular question.

There are seven compulsory questions that must be answered in order to finish the survey.

We recommend that you complete the survey in one sitting as progress will not be saved. You will be shown the percentage of questions you have completed as you work through the survey.

Creating a working environment in which all staff are treated equally and with dignity and respect is incredibly important to us.

As well as informing the evaluation of our gender equality progress, we ask you to provide this information to help us understand whether there are any differences in staff experiences related to other personal characteristics or background.

We will not be able to access individual responses and the personal details you provide will in no way lead to you being identified.

You do not have to provide this information, but we encourage you to do so as the data will help to identify any general issues which need to be addressed or investigated further for particular groups of staff.

This will also help inform our broader equality, diversity and inclusion objectives and activity.

Hive is committed to protecting your identity throughout this process. Please watch the Hive confidentiality video for more information.

No one within the University will ever see your completed questionnaire.

No one within the University will have access to individual responses, raw data or information that could be traced back to an individual.

Reports will be anonymised and will not be produced for groups of fewer than 10 respondents.

Personal details will not be used to identify how individuals have responded, but to better understand the profile of the University and the views and needs of different staff groups.

Your email address will not be used for any other purpose and will be disposed of by Hive at the end of the survey.

We are working with Hive, one of the UK's leading providers of staff surveys and employee engagement research.

Hive have worked with a number of Universities including Sheffield and Sheffield Hallam.

Visit Hive.hr to find out more.

We recognise that the University has internal expertise in survey design, research and analysis but feel that it is appropriate to use an external, independent supplier for the following reasons:

• We can assure staff that the survey data is confidential and that the identity and responses of individual members of staff will never be shared with any member of the University. 
• We can benchmark our results with other universities and a wide range of public and private sector organisations.
• Hive has extensive, specialist knowledge and experience of carrying out employee engagement research. They have systems and experts in place to support the University at every stage of the project, from planning, designing and running the survey to analysing, communicating and responding to the results.

The results will be analysed by us and reported back to the UEB, senior managers, the University’s Athena Swan Self Assessment Team and AdvanceHE Athena Swan in an anonymous format. Departments identified within the survey with 10 or more respondents can also analyse their results to be used in their Athena Swan work. Results will be anonymised and confidentiality will be maintained throughout the process.

The results will be used by the Athena Swan Self Assessment Team to inform our Silver Award application, assess the impact of our 2018-2024 Action Plan and highlight any continuing work for our future action plan. Important themes emerging from the results, and actions to address these, will be communicated to all staff via various channels.

The survey results will be one part of the information we use to evaluate our progress and identify priority areas to focus on for the next five years.

This progress and areas of focus will be shared with university staff in 2024 as we develop our next Athena Swan gender equality action plan.

We will also draw on the survey results to inform our wider EDI priorities and will highlight relevant survey data and feedback when we do this.