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VC Diversity Awards

Rebecca wearing a shirt and trousers in the Master's GardenRebecca Colquhoun (2020, DPhil in Earth Sciences), Disability and Accessibility Officer, was highly commended in the Vice Chancellor’s Diversity Awards. They also nominated Unlearning Racism in Geoscience for the Projects category, which won for Inclusive Culture.

The Unlearning Racism in Geoscience project gave members of the Earth Sciences department an opportunity to educate themselves on what it means to be anti-racist and identified actions the department could take.

Rebecca was nominated in the individual category for leading initiatives that tackle racism, homophobia and ableism at department, college and divisional level and beyond Oxford. Within the Department of Earth Sciences, Rebecca has invited LGBTQ+ speakers to the department careers fair, co-founded the department’s LGBTQ+ affinity group, and co-founded Oxford Unlearning Racism in Geoscience, which produced anti-racism policies and resources. At University College, they advocate for disabled students, running social events and promoting available support. They have shared their own experiences of being neurodiverse to encourage disabled students to apply to university. They are the institutional liaison for the International Society of Non-binary Scientists and co-organised the American Geophysical Union annual LGBTQ+ meet-up.

Rebecca commented, “I’m so delighted to have been highly commended in the VC Diversity Awards. In the 6 years I’ve been at Oxford I’ve seen a lot of progress in diversity and inclusivity and I hope that I’m helping to make that little bit more progress in Earth Sciences and across the university! It’s really nice to have my work recognised in this way, and I am really grateful to Hannah, Louisa and Laura (Stevens, Fellow in Earth Sciences) for nominating me. I certainly couldn’t do any of this alone, I’m privileged to work with some excellent co-conspirators, including Tamsin Savvides (Geology, 2016-2021) who I ran the winning URGE project with, and I’m super excited to see what we can achieve next.”

Published: 15 June 2022

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