UNIC Superdiversity School – Enacting Superdiversity: Towards Critical Change in Higher Education

8 Aug 2022

University College Cork (UCC) hosted an online Superdiversity School in May 2022 (17th-19th) as part of the UNIC initiative. The School is the latest in a series of events being held under the UNIC Superdiversity Academy (WP4), and a total of six Schools are planned for the duration of the project across partner institutions.

Entitled Enacting Superdiversity: Towards Critical Change in Higher Education, the UCC Superdiversity School is the third in this series of events. The event was organised by the Institute for Social Science in the 21st Century (ISS21), which is leading on the UNIC Superdiversity Academy (WP4) at UCC, in conjunction with Access UCC and the university’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Unit.

A comprehensive case study overview of the School is now available to view here.

Aim of School

The overarching aim of the UCC Superdiversity School was to explore the epistemic and practical implications of superdiversity for practices, policies and ‘ways of being’ in the university. A key objective was to facilitate discussion and exchange of ideas and practices, acknowledging that superdiversity is still an emerging concept and providing the space to reflect on what it means for universities.

Each day focused on one of three core themes: teaching and learning, and issues of pedagogy; initiatives promoting access to, and engaging with, diverse groups in higher education spaces; and EDI policies and processes. The focus on these three separate but interconnected domains highlights the range of ways in which superdiversity bears relevance to the university space – in our teaching, in students’ access to education, and in the university’s equality, diversity and inclusion polices.

Daily sessions were led by UCC staff from across the university, underlining the interdisciplinary focus of the School, which was open to all UCC staff and UNIC partner institutions. A guest speaker from London Metropolitan University, Dr Julius Elster, also provided his reflections on research illustrating the potential benefits and complexities of ‘superdiverse’ communities.   

Recordings and slides from the UCC Superdiversity School can be accessed at the following link.