CASE STUDY 02
Increasing D&I in our content and products
We strive to improve representation and accessibility both within our content and products, and in each step of the publishing process. Over the last year, we are proud to have made progress in many areas of OUP.
In Research Books and Reference, we worked with the Creative Diversity Network to build a diversity data survey which we rolled out across all those who have published with us in the past five years.
Designed to give us a retrospective baseline from which we can track our progress, the survey will then be run on a continual basis from this year onwards. We have also rolled out updated volume and series editor guidelines, as well as new author guidelines and best-practice guidance for our in-house team.
In Higher Education, we launched the Global Citizen Hub, an online collection of open access content on social issues for students. We also created new author guidance on writing without bias.
In Journals, we agreed to partner with the Coalition for Diversity & Inclusion in Scholarly Communications (C4DISC) and adopt their Joint Statement of Principles. We finalized our post-publication name change policy, allowing authors to easily and privately request a change of name and/or pronouns associated with their published work.
'For our research publishing to remain relevant, respected, and widely used, we need to commission and publish content that is globally conceived, and to work on the principles of underlying representation.
Our scale means that by pushing on these questions we can help shift approaches in the field.’
Sophie Goldsworthy Director of Content Strategy & Acquisition, and a sponsor of DEI in Academic content
Meanwhile, we have focused on increasing diversity and inclusion across our educational resources within our Education Division.
We collaborated with Penguin Random House and the Runneymede Trust on the Lit in Colour initiative to increase diversity in literature, and more than 50 colleagues took part in the Inclusion Incubator programme to learn about the foundations needed to make books truly inclusive. In October 2021, we created a toolkit for product and marketing teams across the Education division, which includes support to embed D&I as an integral part of their work. This will be frequently reviewed and updated.
'As a leading educational publisher we have always recognized the responsibility we carry for diversity and inclusion.
The creation of the D&I toolkit gives us what we need to put this into practice. We’ve learnt this year that we are on a journey and what we have achieved in 2021 is only the beginning.’
Vivek Govil Managing Director, UK and Education Services and sponsor of D&I in Education content
Between May and June last year, our Education and English Language Teaching (ELT) divisions came together to conduct an audit into our current pool of freelancers and authors.
With the help of EA Inclusion, this provided useful insights to help increase the diversity of the people we work with, identifying where some backgrounds were under-represented, and how we could further support our current freelancers and authors with their understanding of D&I.
Our ELT division have also been working to ensure that our English Language teaching and learning content is as inclusive as possible with an initiative called Inclusive Content.
The vision behind this is:
To learn, you need to be engaged.
To be engaged, you must feel included, valued, and represented.
As part of this initiative, we are developing editorial guidelines to help consider all aspects of diversity and inclusion in the development and promotion of our products and services, and to increase representation.
'Diversity, equity, and inclusion have always been of fundamental importance to me.
Growing up, I didn't see “me” in jobs that I wanted to be in and I didn't really see myself as somebody who could go to university. Now, as a gay mother of twins, it rings equally true when my son doesn’t see his type of family represented in the books he reads. So I’m excited to be sponsoring this initiative in ELT, and lucky that there was already a dedicated and passionate committee in place.’
Sarah Rogerson Director of Assessment, and a sponsor of D&I in ELT
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