University News Last updated 04 November
Birmingham City University (BCU) will play a central role in helping make Birmingham a ‘leading Global Anti Racist City by 2025’, the institution’s Vice-Chancellor David Mba said at a summit in the city.
The commitment came as part of a historic Anti Racist pledge presented by the Birmingham Race Impact Group (BRIG), a consortium including Birmingham City Council, West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA), and Birmingham’s Police and Crime Commissioner.
At the summit organised by BRIG, leaders from across Birmingham came together in a powerful show of unity.
Representing BCU, Vice-Chancellor David Mba said: “By signing this pledge, we hope to ensure our students can prosper in a city united under one goal- to tackle racism wherever we see it.
“We hold an enormous responsibility as a university. Higher education remains one of the most successful ways to encourage upwards social mobility in underrepresented groups and we must ensure education remains a tool to fight racism, not a barrier.
“Through our research, we will also continue to tackle racism wherever we find it, across multiple disciplines including health, education and sports.”
Ranjit Sondhi, BRIG Chair said: “Bringing city and regional leaders together to tackle racism pro-actively must be a game changer. It can’t be left to stagnating policies and procedure, which essentially manages the inequality that exists without trying to change anything. We have worked tirelessly for decades to get the city, region, and its institutions on the same page in tackling racial inequalities seriously.
"Inaction is not a choice. Due to the multiple barriers faced by racialised communities we are aware this has opened up a life expectancy gap of circa 10 years between ethnic minorities and their white counterparts. The response from the system for decades has been “it takes time”, frankly we haven’t got it.
“We live in hope that the signing of the pledge for creating an Anti-Racist Birmingham and West Midlands will be an impactful fore runner for making ‘Birmingham a leading Global Anti Racist City by 2025."
Research produced by BCU is already tackling racial inequality across the West Midlands.
Key findings from BCU’s South Asian Cricket Academy (SACA) set up by PhD researcher Tom Brown found that 30% of recreational cricketers in England and Wales are British South Asian, yet representation drops to under 5% within the professional game. Recently, Jafer Chohan became the first SACA graduate to be called up by the England Team.
An ongoing research project by BCU academics called That’s Me also hopes to eliminate race barriers to postgraduate research study in the West Midlands. They will offer concrete recommendations to regional bodies later this year on the steps required to retain academic talent from different ethnic backgrounds.